Never Kick a Ghost and Other Silly Chillers

by Judy Sierra, Pascale Constantin (Illustrator)

Overview

Yikes! This collection of easy-to-read, silly, spooky tales features a pirate bride, a ghost that grows and grows, and a big slobbery monster.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780061435218
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	07/26/2011
Series:	I Can Read Book 2 Series
Pages:	32
Product dimensions:	5.42(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.13(d)
Lexile:	500L (what's this?)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Judy Sierra is a former children’s librarian who holds a PhD in folklore from UCLA. Well known for her retellings of classic stories and her offbeat, kid-friendly humor, she has written a number of children’s books, including Wild About Books and Antarctic Antics. She lives in Eugene, Oregon.

Pascale Constantin drew her first monster when she was very young. She has since illustrated many children’s books, including Little Monster and Dan’s Bad Dream. She lives in Montreal, Canada.

Editorial Reviews

PreS-Gr 1—In the first appealing beginning reader, Gilman captures the antics of a devoted puppy and her owner as the child tries out for the lead in her school play. Mischief and mayhem ensue as Dixie attempts to help Emma learn her lines for the part of Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. The colorful, realistic illustrations have strong context support and are well balanced on the page, providing a warmhearted perspective to the story line. Children with the acting bug will enjoy Emma's excitement up through performance day, delighting when Dixie gets a lead part, too. Never Kick a Ghost is a collection of stories filled with suspense, silliness, and chills. The whimsical, full-color illustrations enliven the texts. The stories' origins are explained in the back matter. This is a supplementary early reader, particularly for Halloween.—Melissa Smith, Royal Oak Public Library, MI

School Library Journal

Sierra adapts a few spooky tales for the early-reader set with lackluster results.

Most books with this format form a cohesive whole, but the chapters here stand alone for the most part. Three chapters are reworkings of familiar tales. "The Skeleton Bride" is a tale of woe about Blackbeard the Pirate's wife, South Sea Sue. She meets a sad end as the ship sinks—until a diver 100 years later gets a scary surprise. "Never Kick a Ghost" is about mean man Sam Sniff's comeuppance after he repeatedly kicks suspicious white apparitions during a walk through the graveyard. "The Big Slobbery Monster" taunts a child, "Look what I can do / with my long green fingers / and my floppy purple lips." After the boy fails to escape the goofy monster, the creature shows what he can do as he strums his fingers over his mouth: "Blub-blub-a!" One chapter is a quick playground rhyme about witches, and another is a double page-spread with funny epitaphs that are difficult to decipher because the dark-gray text is displayed in varying typefaces on medium-gray headstones. Constantin's mass-market–looking illustrations fail to add any oomph to this disappointing title.

Pass. (Early reader. 4-8)

Kirkus Reviews