Don’t Turn Out the Lights (read these spooky stories instead)!

Alvin Schwartz’s Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark and the two followup collections have scared the wits out of whole generations of kids and campers (and, OK fine, adults too). They are some of the most enduring and beloved American children’s books ever written. So it was both a thrill and a chill to be asked to contribute a spooky story of my own to Don’t Turn Out the Lights: A Tribute to Alvin Schwartz’s Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. Like the title says, it is the first official tribute to the classic stories, published by HarperCollins and the Horror Writers Association.

There are 35 stories, all good, scary fun. Mine is titled “In Stitches,” and like many of Schwartz’s originals, it was inspired by an old American folktale. This one was told to me by my Yankee granddad, about what happens to little kids who talk too much on lazy summer days. (Come to think of it, I was a little kid who talked too much. Hmmm…) I had a ton of fun writing it, so if you’re looking for a spooky story for a stormy night, you can pick the book up at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, your local independent bookstore or wherever books are sold. (True story: I was going to title this post Scary Stories to Sell Like a Dork!) Happy reading—and, of course, BOO!