Don’t let the title fool you – girls will also love this book! 

This is an exciting collection of short stories that will make you bite your nails until the very end. Creepy but funny. Scary but not too scary. There are tales about ghosts, pirates, wishes, a terrible private investigator, and more. 


My favorite story was "Ghost Vision Goggles"; a story about boy who sends away for weird items from the back of old comics. When he receives goggles that let him see ghosts, he gets more than he expected.

The best part of this book? When I held it up in my classroom the first student to jump up and grab it was a girl. Oh yeah, I love that. I don't expect this book to stay on my shelf for long stretches at a time.

The stories are by authors my students already love: Anthony Horowitz, Margaret Peterson Haddix, James Patterson and more!

(Middle grades: 3-6)

Check out the Guys Read website for more information about this book and other reading ideas with boys in mind. (but girls will like them too!)

Gerald is just a typical kid, looking forward to a vacation on the slopes with his friends. But when a death in the family leaves him stinking rich, his life is changed forever.

His mysterious great aunt Geraldine has left him more than just a tremendous fortune, though. She left him a letter declaring that she has been murdered. It's up to Gerald to figure out  who killed her, before he becomes the next victim! 

This week's book of the week is a mystery, as part of my effort to stretch my students beyond the science fiction and fantasy that they adore (Okay, I love it too). The plot is bursting with action that will firmly put it on the "must have" list for middle grade readers. There is even a touch of the fantastic along the way, which will help it appeal to the firmly fantasy contingent. While some of the miraculous coincidences can be a bit of a stretch, I think kids will enjoy the adventures of the resourceful Gerald and the friends he makes along the way. Give it a shot! 

Visit the author's webpage here!http://www.richardnewsome.com/richardnewsome/Home.html


Reviewer's Note: I was provided a copy of the book to read by the publisher - Walden Pond Press. They have a great Twitter feed! @WaldenPondPress 

I had two books to recommend this week, in anticipation of Halloween. In honor of All Hallows Read, I offered this one up to my older, more mature elementary students.

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There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife.”

So begins the creepy tale of Nobody Owens, an infant who escapes the murder of his family and is raised by an unlikely assortment of ghosts and supernatural beings in the local graveyard. This book is not for the faint of heart. Bod, as he is called by his friends, faces dangers and adventures in his graveyard home. If he leaves, however, he’ll be at the mercy the man who assassinated his family, since we learn that Bod was the real target. We follow his childhood and adolescence through a series of chapters that are short stories in style. Each story is fascinating, and Gaiman’s writing style is intense and captivating.

I read this book after several of my strong readers recommended it to me. They commented that it was “scary, but everything turns out okay”.

Recommended for:
5th to 8th graders who enjoy creepy tales, though older students and adults would also enjoy this book (I certainly loved it, as it was very well written!)

Cautions:
The events in his life (especially at the beginning) are frightening at times, and may scare younger or more sensitive readers. In spite of that, the book is not overly graphic in its depiction of those events.

Check out more information at Neil Gaiman's websitehttp://www.neilgaiman.com/works/Books/The+Graveyard+Book/