Carie’s Lists: My 10 Favorite Horror Books for Kids

Today as I was displaying “spooky reads” in my classroom for October, I decided it was a good time to re-post this list of horror books for kids. If I had time to add on to it, I’d add the Lockwood & Co. series (I’m surprised it wasn’t on here to begin with– I adore it) and Diary of a Haunting by M. Verano and I am Not a Serial Killer by Dan Wells.

Carie Juettner's avatarCarie Juettner

Dorrie From Dorrie and the Blue Witch

When I was a kid, I watched a lot of Scooby-Doo, and I wanted to love it. The show had so much going for it—a giant talking dog, a cool van, creepy caretakers, haunted carnivals, lots of hiding in barrels and chase scene montages—but there was a problem. At the end of every episode, the ghost or ghoul always turned out to be some boring person wearing a disguise and complaining about “meddling kids.” I was so disappointed. Stop unmasking my monsters! I wanted to yell at the Scooby-Doo gang. I wanted real ghosts, real phantoms, real horror, not some grouchy hotel manager in a sheet.

The same thing kept happening in the books I read. Banshee shrieks became screech owl calls, footsteps in the attic turned out to be rats, and skeletal figures were revealed as shadows of tree limbs. Where were…

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Published by Carie Juettner

Carie Juettner is a former middle school teacher and the author of five books in the Spooky America series, including The Ghostly Tales of Dallas and the The Ghostly Tales of New England. Her poems and short stories have appeared in publications such as The Twin Bill, Nature Futures, and Daily Science Fiction. Carie lives in Richardson, Texas, with her husband and pets. She spends her time reading, writing, and volunteering for an organization that rehabs injured and orphaned wildlife.

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