Can't Scare Me! Not Very Scary by Carol Brendler

Dear Melly,

Please come tonight. I have a surprise for you!

Your Ghouly Cousin,
Malberta

It's an invitation from her favorite cousin, and on Halloween night. too. Malberta is the surprise queen! Melly Monster can't wait!

She sets out through the early twilight. The bats are already flitting, and it's gloomy and dark under low clouds. And what's following her through the gloom?

It's just one black cat.

"THAT'S NOT THE LEAST BIT SCARY," SAID MELLY, FEELING VERY BRAVE.

But then as the black cat continues to shadow her, she sees two skittish skeletons who fall in line behind.

"NOT QUITE SCARY," SAID MELLY, AS SHE SHUDDERED FROM HER HORNS RIGHT DOWN TO HER HEELS.

But then she feels her fur standing straight up, because the gang of strangers keeps growing behind her--three wheezy witches, four mournful ghosts, five grimy goblins, six sullen mummies, seven fierce fruit bats, eight spindly spiders, and as Melly begins to run toward Malberta's house, nine rambunctious rats scamper to fall in line.

There's a pattern in her retinue, and Melly has to admit that the scary factor is rising! As she unlatches Malberta's gate, the air behind her is filled with ten vexing vultures, and she has to admit that although it's not VERY SCARY, her fangs just might be chattering as she rings Malberta's spooky doorbell!

But in Carol Brendler's not-too-scary story, Not Very Scary (Farrar, Straus and Giroux,2014), there is, of course, a party waiting for Melly, as well as for all her seasonal followers, inside Malberta's dark house, with games like bobbing for crawdads and pinning the drool on the ghoul waiting for them to make merry. In this jolly little cumulative Halloween counting book, Theodor Seuss Geisel award-winning artist Gary Pizzoli provides the treats, dishing up just the sort of (not very) scary denizens for the evening in all the appropriate colors, and Melly's black-clad three-eyed cousin is the hostess with the mostess! "A terrific Halloween title to share with those readers who prefer giggles to shivers," croaks Kirkus Reviews.