Posts Tagged Halloween

Interview – Christine Virnig, author of A BITE ABOVE THE REST

I had the great luck to get to read an early copy of Christine Virnig’s latest middle-grade – a Halloween themed adventure set in the very unique town of Samhain,Wisconsin. And, even though Halloween is still a few month’s away, I’m sure my interview with Christine is going to have you itching to break out the wax vampire fangs and your best monster lawn decorations.

Please tell us a little bit about A BITE ABOVE THE REST.

First of all, thank you so much for taking the time to interview me! I really appreciate it!

A Bite Above the Rest is about a kid who moves from California to Samhain, Wisconsin, a tourist town where it’s Halloween 24/7. Halloween decorations stay up year-round, people wear costumes every day, and the town hall keeps vampire hours, of all things. Being the new kid is hard enough on its own, but then a terrifying encounter with the mayor causes Caleb to wonder: Could there be more to his new hometown than meets the eye? Could real vampires and werewolves and witches be hiding amongst the fakes? He immediately sets out to uncover the truth, aided by his quirky new best friend, Tai.

The premise of this book is super interesting and super fun. What inspired you to write this story?

I was inspired to write A Bite Above the Rest from the moment the main character, Caleb, popped into my head one day. The poor kid was walking around with a wooden stake in his back pocket because he was terrified that he’d encounter a vampire or werewolf or witch at any second. But as scared as he was, nobody around him was frightened. They were all just going about their business as though nothing was wrong. I was immediately filled with questions—Who was this kid? Where was he? Why was nobody else scared?—and A Bite Above the Rest was basically my attempt to answer these questions.

You tackle some very real issues in this book. A parent’s death, a new town, bullying, and anxiety among others. What do you hope readers will take away from Caleb and Tai’s adventure?

I actually didn’t write A Bite Above the Rest with any lessons or take aways in mind; my only goal was for readers to have fun reading it. But despite this, I do hope that Caleb and Tai’s adventure will show kids that we can all be brave when we need to be, especially when we’ve got a good friend at our side.

Caleb and Tai do a lot of research on monsters. Werewolves, vampires, witches, and merfolk all play a part in this book. Do you have a favorite scary being? If so, what about them do you love?

Probably vampires?? I find their lore absolutely fascinating, and I love the idea of living f-o-r-e-v-e-r.

I have always been terrible at coming up with Halloween costumes/decorations. The thought of doing it every day is exhausting to me, so I really appreciated Caleb’s approach. What about you? Are you a Halloween superfan? Do you have a favorite costume from your childhood? Do you go all out decorating your house now?

Apart from the candy, I actually didn’t like Halloween that much when I was growing up. A large part of this dislike was the costumes; they always made me feel awkward and exposed. I still feel this way as an adult, so I’m a huge fan of Caleb-style punny costumes myself. This year I think I’ll go as a fork in the road!

And no, I don’t go all out decorating my house for Halloween. But thanks to the throngs of spiders that LOVE living by our front door, we’re at least bound to have a bunch of very authentic-looking spider webs hanging about 🙂

Will you tell us a little bit about your writing process? In particular how did you go about tackling this story?

My writing process for fiction is supremely inefficient. As soon as I come up with an idea—which might be a character, a setting, a theme—I brainstorm just enough so that I can start writing, and then I let the characters do their thing. This writing style is definitely fun (for example, I didn’t know if Caleb’s suspicions about his new town would end up being real or not until I was halfway done writing, which meant I got to be surprised too!), but it does mean I need to do a lot of revising and rewriting once I finally finish my first draft.

We know no writer is created in a vacuum. Could you tell the readers about a teacher or a librarian who had an effect on your writing life?

Yes! When I was first considering writing for children, I asked the youth librarian at the public library in Verona, Wisconsin to point me towards a few of their most popular middle grade titles. Among others, she grabbed How They Croaked by Georgia Bragg. This nonfiction book was my first introduction to the world of FUNNY nonfiction, and it inspired me to write my first two books: Dung for Dinner and Waist-Deep in Dung. I wish I knew that librarian’s name so I could thank her for unknowingly giving me the inspiration I needed to just start writing.

A Bite Above the Rest ends with Caleb getting some worrying information. Can you give us a hint about what we can look forward to next from you?

Of course! As much as I’d love to revisit the world of Caleb and Tai and Samhain at some point—and I already have some ideas!—my next book is another standalone that I hope fans of A Bite Above the Rest will really love. Slated to come out in late 2025, it features a cast of ghostly main characters who attend Phantom Academy, a school for underaged ghosts. I also have a picture book coming out sometime in the next few years, but those details are still hush hush.

 

Christine Virnig is a fan of books, candy, spooky stories, poop jokes, and coffee…in no particular order. As a former physician, Christine now spends her days writing books, reading books, and working at a library where she is surrounded by books. Christine lives in southern Wisconsin with her husband, two daughters, a ridiculous number of dust bunnies, and one incredibly lazy cat. You can visit her on the web at ChristineVirnig.com.

 

A BITE ABOVE THE REST is out now and available for purchase here or at your favorite bookstore. You can follow Christine on at her website or on Instagram.

 

 

Are you ready for some Halloween fun? If so, let us know in the comments.

 

 

 

Should Parents Let Their Kids Read Scary Books?

It’s the season of all things spooky, and readers of all ages are reaching for scary books. But for middle-graders, should parents, teachers, and librarians step in and vet kids’ frightening picks, or let their newly-independent readers decide for themselves how much spookiness they can handle?

To get advice, I turned to two experts: Derek Furr, Associate Professor of Literature & Dean of Teacher Education at Bard College, a reading specialist and former schoolteacher, and Trish Grace Malone, a children’s book author and psychotherapist based in the Hudson Valley. 

Image by PublicDomainPictures from Pixabay

Image by PublicDomainPictures from Pixabay

To start, it’s totally common if the children you know love reading frightening tales. After all, Malone says, “Scary stories are as old as storytelling and they fulfill important human needs. They draw us in with an immediate and compelling message – What would I or could I do if I were in this kind of scary situation? We are hard-wired by evolution to be very interested in how to survive,”

“There is satisfaction, even a kind of physical pleasure, that comes from not knowing, wanting to know, and finding out.”

A frightening page-turner’s attraction may be the same reason that such texts appeal to adults, adds Furr. “When reading a novel for pleasure, most of us read for the plot. A burning question pulls us in, suspense keeps us turning the pages, and a resolution is gratifying (especially if we’ve been right!) There is satisfaction, even a kind of physical pleasure, that comes from not knowing, wanting to know, and finding out.”

Beyond the engrossing thrills and chills, scary books can be beneficial for kids for a variety of reasons.  According to Malone, these books “Teach us lessons, like a ‘Beware of Dog’ sign for the psyche. Children need to know what might put them in danger. It might not be safe to trust a stranger with a house made of cookies and candy. Children also can feel a vicarious sense of courage and triumph by reading about how to defeat the monsters that lurk in dark corners.”

And Furr says that when he taught middle school, his students “devoured” the Goosebumps and Animorphs books, and that doing so seemed to set them up for more challenging ‘horror’ like Poe and Shirley Jackson down the line. Any genre that gets kids reading at this stage is, in his opinion, fantastic. “Remember that the intermediate years (grades four through nine) are crucial for the development of reading fluency—that is, increased reading speed by rapid word/vocabulary recognition and a sense of prosody. Reading volume–just the sheer amount of reading that a young person does, regularly–correlates with fluency and vocabulary development. Unsurprisingly, it has also been shown to correlate with academic achievement.”

“Exerting some kind of creative control over what scares us is one of the most powerful ways to deal with our fears.” 

I asked both my experts if parents should intervene if they’re concerned their student is going to scare themselves silly. Furr says, “I always think that it’s best to follow the child, especially if they’re reading,” but if your concern is that the subject matter may be inappropriate, he suggests reading along with the young person so you can discuss the book together.

Image by Peter H from Pixabay

Image by Peter H from Pixaba

Malone believes that most kids are smart about choosing the level of scary they can tolerate, and typically stop reading if the material is too much for them, but, “if you have a child who is dealing with anxiety, they may need support in avoiding scary stuff that other kids their age find fun, especially as they may feel some shame at their own sensitivity.”

But facing their fears in a safe way — inside the pages of an amazing book or story — is healthy and enjoyable for most #kidlit readers. And, Malone adds, “Ultimately, exerting some kind of creative control over what scares us is one of the most powerful ways to deal with our fears. That drives a lot of writers to write scary stuff in the first place, including me.”

Experts: 

Trish Grace Malone, a children’s book author and psychotherapist based in the Hudson Valley 

Derek Furr, Associate Professor of Literature & Dean of Teacher Education at Bard College

Scary Stories Via Podcast – Halloween Isn’t Just for Books

creeping hour logo

It’s the most wonderful time of the year ….. for scary stories and books about things that go bump in the night! Halloween lovers rejoice as visions of zombies, witches, ghosts, werewolves, even cuddle bunnies (thanks to MUF contributor Jonathan Rosen) dance eerily through our heads.

Jonathan Rosen, Night of the Living Cuddle Bunnies

Slime and blood, clacking bones and freakishly long teeth, and of course a soul-rending howl or two — they’re all the stuff of a good MG scare. Plus, they might also pack an added benefit by showing children ways to navigate some of the darker emotions they’ll face — fear, anxiety, anger — in a safe space. (As long as they do, in fact, live in a safe space they can return to when their book is finished.)

But the printed page is not the only place we can expose our children to scary Halloween-esque fiction.  In today’s on-demand world,  scary stories via podcast is also an increasingly popular way to get your fix of a good scary yarn.

The Podcast

The online world of pre-recorded storytelling is growing by leaps and bounds, and we’re about to meet a new and quite talented contributor to the genre of fiction podcast in just a minute. But before we get to that, let’s just be clear. Listening to stories isn’t new. Audiobooks have been around for decades — formerly quaintly known as “books on tape.” (Like, you know, cassettes. Smile.)

The Golden Age of Radio

Before that … some of us (like me) are old enough that our parents actually listened to books on LIVE RADIO. “Let’s Pretend,” “The Lone Ranger,” “The Amazing Adventures of Superman,” and more were serialized fiction nearly a hundred years ago, in the 1930’s. Of course, the offering wasn’t nearly as culturally or thematically diverse as today’s fare, but then neither were the printed books.

The War of the Worlds

Some of those stories were QUITE scary.

Orson Wells narrates the War of the Worlds

The War of the Worlds was a fictionalized news broadcast aired on CBS radio in 1938. The radio play narrated an alien invasion in progress–and panicked a whole generation of listeners. Its effects were enormous–so many people believed it was actually happening, they jumped in their cars, trying to escape. For author Elie Lichtschein, creator of the podcast The Creeping Hour, (produced by WGBH radio in Boston, MA) that thrill of fear inspires his writing today.

The Creeping Hour

The Creeping Hour podcast is a five-episode anthology — plenty of opportunity for scary stories via podcast. It’s hosted by “The Creeps” — teenage friends and monsters themselves. WGBH bills the broadcast as “family-friendly horror… for kids ages 8 – 12 but parents shouldn’t be afraid to listen along as well.”

creeping hour logo

Each “chapter” or episode of The Creeping Hour is hosted by “the Creeps,” three teenage friends who became monsters after hearing too many scary stories.  

Interview with Elie Lichtschein, creator of The Creeping Hour:

We had a chance to interview Elie about his podcast and how he created the vibe of an old-time horror show for today’s listeners.

MUF: What’s the origin story for “The Creeping Hour?”

EL: Great question! The short answer is that last autumn I approached Nina Porzucki (who’s the Managing Producer of Podcasts at WGBH) about co-producing a horror anthology series podcast for kids and was thrilled to find that she was as excited by the idea as I was. Nina brought in Hillary Wells, the executive producer on the series and director of youth media at WGBH, and Kate Ida, a fantastic producer there, and The Creeping Hour was born!

The longer story is that several years before then I was working as a journalist for NewsCorp, covering the news by day and writing dark and weird kids horror stories at night. My team launched an in-house news podcast, which inspired me to try to do the same for the stories I was writing. My first iteration was called Middle Grade Horror was much more low-fi and DIY-feel and published on the Jewish Coffee House podcast network. But it was instrumental in teaching me the ropes of writing kids audio and also helped me meet people who were and remain strong champions of kids audio programming, and helped pave a path to The Creeping Hour.)

Podcast or Print?

MUF: Why did you choose to go with scary stories via podcast for your distribution rather than print an anthology and turn it into an audiobook?

EL: I was thinking mainly of speed – I wrote these episodes with my co-writer, Annie Kronenberg, in April/May of this year and they’re out in polished final form now, in October! That speed from ideas to script to production to final product is just incredible and not something I’d have found as easily if I tried to publish an anthology and then convert it / sell it as an audiobook.

MUF: Why did you choose to team with WGBH instead of an independent production?

EL: I was looking for a production partner who could nicely complement the skills and experience I’d be bringing to the project. WGBH, with its resources, reach, and bevy of fantastic projects, seemed like a great co-partner. And they absolutely have been, at every part of the pre, production, and post stage of creating these five episodes. It’s been beyond a pleasure to work with them, especially Kate, Hillary, and Nina, and this project would look and sound vastly different without their contributions.

Writing the Shows

MUF: Who writes the stories/episodes, and are they also available in book form – or is there a plan to publish the anthology?

EL: I wrote the scripts with Annie Kronenberg, a fantastic writer I met through a friend who oversees the Writers House editorial internship program, which we both went through. Annie took the lead on writing the second episode, “Out of the Wind,” and I took the lead on the others. There’s no current plan in place to publish the stories in other formats, although the idea is tempting!

MUF: If they don’t write the stories, are the three hosts authors? Actors?

EL: All three of them are screen and VO actors, but Kizzmett Pringle (who voices Axe) and Alexis Collins (who voices Weta) do more screen and stage work, and Matthew Gumley (who voices Toro) is also a rock musician and performs a bunch.

The Creeps:

The Creeping Hour Hosts

Behind the Stories

MUF: What are the inspirations for the episodes?

EL: Hmm, I mean I’d say the overall inspiration is to scare kids ;-). But we tried coming up with stories that could be aurally frightening in new ways. These include building scares by focusing on repetitive words (like the “Dirt spy! Dirt spy!”) in “Meet the Creeps”) or through pairing creepy monster sounds with creepy natural world noises ( like the monster / weather-based scares in “Out of the Wind”), or using a creepy piece of music as almost a character that uses sound to latch onto its victims (as in the season finale, “The Beat,” which comes out on Halloween).

MUF: What’s your favorite episode – the one you’d point new listeners to?

EL: I really love what we did with the final episode of the series – “The Beat” – and can see it being a great starting point to get listeners listening. (It’s not up yet, though, so I don’t have the link unfortunately)

MUF NOTE: “The Beat” will drop ON HALLOWEEN ….. 

I also think the second episode, “Out of the Wind” (Click on link to listen to a snippet of this episode.)

MUF: What’s next for “The Creeping Hour?”

EL: Good question! Well, there are still two more episodes yet to drop in this first season, but hopefully we’ll keep telling creepy stories that continue to scare kids in ways that make creative use of the audio medium.

Elie’s Halloween Book List and Podcast List

MUF: What are your favorite middle-grade fiction podcasts that AREN’T yours?

EL: I loved Mars Patel and just came across Adam Gidwitz’s Grimm podcast with Pinna, which looks incredible, can’t wait to dive in.

MUF: What are some of your favorite printed spooky Halloween books for middle grade readers?

I just read Apocalypse Taco, which is a graphic novel by Nathan Hale, and LOVED it. An old classic is the Tintin story, Flight 714, which brings the intrepid boy reporter face to face with aliens and mind control and villains’ lairs hidden deep inside active volcanoes. Also, I can’t get past Eric Kimmel’s picture book, Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins, which has some of the most horrifying monster illustrations (done by Trina Schart Hyman) in any kid book I’ve ever come across (and also riffs lightly on the “Shaydm” that appear in episode three of The Creeping Hour). Also, you can’t go wrong with Neil Gaiman’s Coraline and I loved Jonathan Auxier’s The Night Gardener. Cf course then there’s Goosebumps – some of my favorites are The Horror at Camp Jellyjam, Deep Trouble, and A Night in Terror Tower.

The Creeping Hour Artwork

EL:  The artwork for the series was done by the incredible Parker S. Jackson. Just want to give him a shout out because he’s so great!

And WGBH made these incredible Snapchat filters that can turn you into a Creep! You can find them here: https://thecreepinghour.org/articles/transform-yourself-into-a-creep-s1!e3f16

How to Find The Creeping Hour:

Listen here.

Thanks so much, Elie; it’s been a pleasure.

And … HAPPY HALLOWEEN to all our MUF creeps!

 

Elie Lichtschein

Podcast Author E.ie Lichtschein

Elie Lichtschein is a writer and producer based in Manhattan. He’s the writer and co-creator of The Creeping Hour podcast (WGBH/PRX, October 2019). His fiction has appeared in It’s A Whole Spiel (Knopf, September 2019). He’s currently working on a middle grade adventure novel with PJ Library. Visit him online at elielicht.com or on social media @elielicht