Halloween—October 31, 2011
It’s nearly Halloween and a kind of excitement is in the air. Mother Nature has already donned her costume of gold and crimson Her summer warmth has been replaced by chilly gusts which chase fallen leaves into yards and streets. Porches and store fronts are dressed with jack-o-lanterns and scarecrows waiting for the annual parade of goblins, witches and a thousand other characters who scatter everywhere, gleefully shouting “Boo!” or “Trick or Treat”.
While some of these costume-clad celebrants are content to collect a bounty of candy, others bravely ignore their pounding hearts as they enter dark mysterious haunted houses. Creeeeeepy! The ghouls inside these frightening sites wait quietly to hear blood curdling screams from even the toughest thrill seekers.
Some ideas for your own House of Horror can be found in HOW TO HAUNT A HOUSE FOR HALLOWEEN by Robert Friedhauffer. Decorating your own home for Halloween is easy with books like FUN TO MAKE CRAFTS FOR HALLOWEEN by Tom Daning which gives easy directions for over a hundred spooky crafts. Help with carving the perfect pumpkin face can be found in CARVING JACK-O-LANTERNS by Sam Gendusa. Your library also subscribes to magazines such as BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS and PACK-O-FUN which have even more ideas for a spooky Halloween. Don’t forget the eerie sounds needed to insure just a bit of knuckle biting uncertainty. A CD titled PHANTOM should do the job nicely.
When your small, weary celebrants have shuddered enough for the day, a Halloween story is the perfect bedtime activity. POULTRYGEIST by Mary Jane Auch contains a humorous dialog among a group of farm animals and two noisy roosters. The illustrations add to the fun. The story of HALLOWEEN NIGHT by Arden Druce is told in rhyme with colorful costumed tricksters drawn by David Wenzel. MOULDYLOCKS by Bernard Lodge is strictly for laughs with phrases like, “Take that, you silly centipede”. Just in case a novice trick-or-treater needs reassurance about being safe from all those “creatures”, SWITCH ON THE NIGHT by Ray Bradbury should help replace those fears with dream-filled sleep. The pictures in this story are framed on each page opposite text in verse. The white pages become black as a frightened boy in the story is soothed by a character named “Dark” and an imaginary little girl.
Trick or Treaters are invited to stop by the library on Halloween evening for a treat. HAPPY HALLOREADING!
