Scary School (Scary School)

by Derek the Ghost

[inlibrisveritas]

Scary School is a middle grade paranormal fantasy heavy on the humor and lighthearted situations, even though it’s methods are a little unorthodox.

Our story teller is Derek the Ghost, who take more of an observance role than anything else and who tells us about a year at Scary School. This is the year that the Ghoul Games are to take place, and Derek gives us a look at the events that lead up to the event. Scary School is a bit…weird, in a good way. It’s the first human/monster hybrid school ever and the students range from the rule following kid next door to a basketball playing werewolf, and the teachers are more likely to eat their students than actually teach them something. In fact kids tend to find out mortality isn’t exactly something that sticks in Scary School, each death giving them a chance to learn a new lesson…like don’t make a vampire teacher mad, or follow all the rules in the 9 foot dragon’s class or else. It’s a super fun novel,with some great humor. There was a portion with something called Monster Math that basically felt like my entire history with math, and I really enjoyed that quite a bit. I also really loved Petunia’s chapter, and I think that one really took the cake for being both creepy and really cool all at the same time. I do feel that the Ghoul Games happened too quickly though, I wanted a bit more about them but I did enjoy seeing the monster’s go up against mostly normal kids. I can definitely see why kids are loving this series. It brings that creepy factor kids tend to enjoy (hello goosebumps) and turns it into a bit of lighthearted fun! I will say that the writing for this one a bit on the simple side so it could work well with 4th through 6th grade reading levels.

The audio was a bit of fun as well, and would be great for kids. The reader is actually the author and he knows his characters well, and is pretty energetic in the delivery. He knows when to go for laughs, and I know of few kids who would really enjoy this audio. I will say that he’s not my favorite reader though. But again, I think he did a great job with delivery for a story marketed towards kids.

I really think this author is on to something with this series, and I do think I’ll be finding the next books in the series to read. It seems like it could be a rather fun ride