I found this fair-condition softcover at a local thrift shop, for another release copy. It's a nice creepy collection with an interesting variety of stories. Among my favorites: Kelly Link's "The Wrong Grave," in which a teenaged boy emulates Dante Gabriel Rossetti in trying to dig up his dead girlfriend's grave to retrieve some poems; this one has some delightful twists. Annette Curtis Klause's "Kissing Dead Boys," in which a young woman haunts vampire bars seeking out bloodsuckers for purposes of her own. Marcus Sedgwick's "The Heart of Another," themed on Poe's "Tell-tale Heart" but dealing with a student whose heart-transplant seems to have provided surprising insights into the cause of the donor's death. Herbie Brennan's "The Necromancers" is a light-hearted look at demon-summoning. "The Gray Boy's Work" by M. T. Anderson is a very unusual story set in post-Civil-War times, and featuring a kind of magical-realism in which icons from paintings and maps are real elements in the landscape. My second-favorite is Holly Black's "The Poison Eaters," in which three girls are raised on a diet of poisonous herbs in order to turn them into weapons - but the story's within another story, and the layers are darkly intriguing. And for me the last is best: Nancy Etchemendy's "Honey in the Wound," a rather heartbreaking story of a family tragedy, with an attempt at magical healing that doesn't go well. Good collection!

I left this book in the Little Free Library on this rainy day; hope someone enjoys it!

[See other recent releases in NH here.]

*** Released for the 2018 Spook-Tacular October release challenge. ***

*** Released for the 2018 Tick Tock release challenge. ***