Status Updates From Scary Stories 3: More Tales...

The "Notes and Sources" section of the three books in this trilogy are must-reads. They act as a debriefing for the horrors and hauntings of the stories, and I take advantage of that opportunity every time. You also learn a lot from these historical notes, and often they're entertaining.

I love the eeriness of the ghost in this illustration. It gives that much more oomph to the punchline on the next page.

I love this picture and its story. "Is Something Wrong?" remains one of my favorite funny tales in any of Alvin Schwartz's Scary Stories books.

"The Hog" is grouped with the supposedly humorous stories, but I find it more wistful than funny. Still, it's very good.

"The Trouble" does slow this book down, but it's an unexpected change of pace.

For an arachnophobe, could there be a more horrifying illustration?

"Maybe You Will Remember" gives me chills every single time.

Here we go with "Maybe You Will Remember", the undisputed masterpiece of this book.

I'll see if I can finish this book tonight. It's been a busy week, culminating in our house party last night, but there are few books that make for better Halloween reading than Alvin Schwartz and Stephen Gammell's Scary Stories trilogy.

The Five Nightmares section is one of the most potent in any book of the Scary Stories trilogy. And here it comes...

Ah, "Such Things Happen", a Scary Stories classic. I love how involved and extended this particular tale is.

"Harold" is a scary and powerful story, a conduct warning: impose your own angry, gossipy vision of a bad person onto one who has done nothing to deserve those labels, and the negativity may turn that "blank slate" into a danger you couldn't imagine. Be careful of framing the motives and personality of others as a way of venting your spleen.

Up next, "Harold". A true classic of the Scary Stories trilogy if ever there were one. Each paragraph is as creepy as the double-page opening illustration. Alvin Schwartz and Stephen Gammell are a duo nonpareil.

The distorted illustration of the horse skeleton is every bit as unsettling as the ending of the story about Bess, maybe more.

Stephen Gammell's first great illustration with this book's main text. The staircase is more surreal and viscerally haunting than in the story, by far, and somehow that works to perfection.

Stephen Gammell is good as usual in these opening ghost stories, but Alvin Schwartz has been even better. His literary blending of the macabre and eerie so far is sublime.

"The Bus Stop" is another story of subtle emotional power. Alvin Schwartz is taking no prisoners so far.

"The Appointment" is a powerful story, short as it is. Rearranging your whole lifestyle to avoid perceived risk won't make your life better or safer, it simply introduces new risks that may cut your life short even sooner.