  | Full Text Reviews: Bulletin for the Center... - 11/01/2001 Ten tales of the supernatural appear in this new collection by the popular Stine. Plots have time-honored turns: a boy turns the clock back way too far during “The Halloween Dance,” a brother and sister foil “The Bad Babysitter,” a ghost deprived of an ocean voyage demands “Take Me With You” of a young girl, and a young artist confounds a mentor from beyond the grave in “Can You Draw Me?”, and so on. This is slick campfire-and-pajama-party stuff, told with an eye toward the easy thrill and the surprise ending, and the predictability of the stories and the unsophisticated storytelling won’t keep Stine fans old and new from swallowing this down in one big gulp. Stine introduces each story with a brief paragraph describing the incident or memory that inspired it, and his collegial, friendly tone may inspire readers to some storytelling of their own. The title spreads for these tales (by such notable artists as Art Spiegelman, Greg Call, and John Jude Palencar) are black-and-white illustrations with creepy “Tales of the Crypt” images—mummies, bats, cobwebs, spiders, etc.—rendered in various stages of decay. The cover—an hourglass with a staring skull set on luminous paper—will draw kids like a magnet. - Copyright 2001 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. Loading...
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