NEW YORK CITY, Oct 30 — Get comfy with a bowl of candy and a scary book plucked from the net’s All Hallows Read recommendations.
Set up in 2010 by “Coraline” and “The Graveyard Book” author Neil Gaiman, publishers and book blogs have got on board for All Hallows Read, the annual giving-and-receiving of knee-knocking novels. Do you agree with them? What would you choose?
US publisher Random House recommends graphic novel “The Spectral Engine” by Ray Fawkes, while Neil himself delivered a list of 11 scary book recommendations to the HarperCollins Children’s Books tumblr account, starting off with “The Time of the Ghost” by Diana Wynne Jones.
The HarperCollins imprint is also using a Pinterest board to collect over 50 covers for appropriately themed books, including “The Peculiar” by Stefan Bachmann and “The Teeny Tiny Ghost.”
Turning to blogs, Book Riot selects 10 picks for kids, including “Frankenstein Takes the Cake” and “A Very Brave Witch,” while the Bookish selection moves into more adult territory: its 12 titles include “Sharp Objects,” -- the debut from Edgar-nominated author Gillian Flynn of “Gone Girl” fame -- Patricia Cornwell’s Jack the Ripper profile “Portrait of a Killer” and “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark” by Alvin Schwartz.
Insert Geek Here plumped for a double double-header with “The Strain Trilogy” (co-written by “Pan’s Labyrinth” director Guillermo Del Toro) and “It” by Stephen King in the traditional section, and Mike Mignola’s “Hellboy: The Midnight Circus” and Grant Morrison’s “Arkham Asylum: A Serious House in Serious Earth” winning the graphic novel recommendations.
And if you’re looking for a suitably spooky bookmark for your scary story of choice, turn to the official Gaiman-themed merch site neverwear.net, which has bookmarks based on the work of New York illustrator Sean Von Gorman, winner of this year’s AHR artwork contest. — AFP Relaxnews
