A Hen's Eye View! Minerva Louise on Halloween by Janet Morgan Stoeke

Minerva Louise loved it in the fall when the pumpkins came to visit.

Minerva Louis is a hen, and so she sees things from a particularly poultry-ish point of view.

The visiting pumpkins are carved Jack-O'-Lanterns on the porch. The cheerful farmers are really kids in their Halloween costumes--dressed a a pirate, a pink and pretty kitty cat, a little busy bee, a witch, and a cowboy. And the rock gardens that the "farmers" are planting look suspiciously like fake tombstones in the front yard.

Then Minerva notices a skeletal "farmer" with a scythe...

But he looks too skinny to dig!

And the little farmers are so thirsty that they are sticking their heads way down in a big wooden tub of water and coming up with apples.

Look! Now all the wet sheets from the clothesline is running around the yard flapping! Even the pumpkins are all hot and bothered!

What's gotten you guys so fired up!

And now why are all the farmers ringing the doorbell, yelling "TRICK OR TREAT?"

Wait! They're getting corn!

Corn is something a hen can really get behind (or in front of) as Minerva grabs a muffin cup and gets herself some candy corn, in Janet Morgan Stoeke's humorous look at a hen's-eye view of Halloween, Minerva Louise on Halloween (Dutton Books).  This cheery book gives younger children a jolly introduction to the customs of Halloween and beginning readers a story they can read, while older readers will get a giggle or two out of Minerva's dumb-cluck interpretation of Halloween ways. Other stories about this holiday-loving hen are Minerva Louise on Christmas Eve and Minerva Louise and the Colorful Eggs.

Alien Stranger! E. T. The Extraterrestrial by Melissa Mathison

It was the week before Halloween. Elliott wanted to play with his brother Michael, but he said "NO."

I can fight goblins, too!" said Elliott

"Just go get the pizza," said Michael.

Elliot trudges out to pay for their pizza delivery, feeling a bit sad that his brother no longer wants to play with him. But when he hears a noise and spots some strange tracks, he forgets all about Michael and follows the odd footprints into their dark shed.

It definitely wasn't a coyote!

But when Elliott tries to convince his family that there's something or someone really weird out there, Michael is only interested in the pizza.

When Elliott goes out to look for the strange goblin by day, he sees uniformed people with odd equipment searching the area. Wanting to help the strange visitor, Elliott leaves a trail of candy to try to attract the little stranger to the house. And when he and sister find the alien being snacking in their house, they disguise him as a treat-or-treater and sneak him into the woods, where he tells them he's going to "call home." And what the two see is a Halloween night Elliott will never forget.

If trick-or-treat excursions aren't exciting enough, Melissa Mathison's picture book version E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial: The Classic Illustrated Storybook (Pop Classics)(Quirk Books, 2019) gives young readers a a quick preview of the blockbuster movie, E.T. But you'll need an alien costume and perhaps a hankie for the sweet and sad parts, just right for the scary season. And don't forget the Reese's Pieces!

Wanna Spook a Spook? How to Scare A Ghost by Jean Reagan

DO YOU WANT TO SCARE A GHOST?

It's like the old saw about making rabbit stew: first you have to catch the rabbit. And to spook a spook, the season in which you look is important!

THE EASIEST, SPOOKIEST TIME IS...HALLOWEEN!

Make your house and yard look appealing to ghosts. Conceal scarecrows (but not that well) in the backyard so the specters will feel at home. Park a few creepy Jack o' lanterns around the place. Crank up the speakers with some scary sounds. At school be sure to do some Halloween-y stuff, like bobbing for apples and putting out black-and-orange cupcakes. Ghosts are also attracted by the smell of glue and the sparkle of glitter in homemade decorations.

But be forewarned: it's not so easy to recognize a ghost at Halloween. There are lots of kids in sheets or store-bought costumes. But there's one sure way to tell. Invite the suspected spook home after school on the day your mom always vacuums the house.

Ghosts (and cats) are terrified of vacuum cleaners!

There are other sure ways to tell a ghost from a kid in costume.

Try the seesaw test: if the sure-enough spook sits down on the high side, it doesn't go down. Or, try the trampoline test:

YUP! NO BOUNCE!

But by the time the potential ghost is verified, he's more like a buddy who needs some trick-or-treating tips, one who'll give you all his stash, in Jean Reagan's latest in her popular How To series, How to Scare a Ghost (Alfred A. Knopf, 2018). Artist Lee Wildish again adds his comic sight gags to this Halloween How To manual, as when the friendly ghost, in a loaner robot costume, forgets himself and floats too high, scaring the bystanders when they see he has ...

AAGH! NO FEET!!!

This newest for youngsters by Reagan and Wildish is a lighthearted look at the scary season. Says Publishers Weekly,"... a playful Halloween story for readers not ready for scarier fare."

Too Many Tricks or Treats? The Twelve Days of Halloween by Jenna Lattice

ON THE FIRST DAY OF HALLOWEEN
WHAT SHOWED UP AT OUR DOOR?

ONE VERY EAGER
TRICK OR TREATER!

When most kids think of counting on Halloween, they think of toting up the candy bars in the loot piled in their plastic pumpkin.

But Jenna Lattice's The 12 Days of Halloween (Pictureback(R)) (Random House, 2017) offers youngsters a chance to count along as the usual articles of Halloween count up (or down) to the big day! First, we need to decorate the front porch--

Two stuffed scarecrows, three grinning pumpkins....

And how about creeping spiders? Black cats yowling? Haunts a'haunting? And to anchor the count, a line to repeat: (Two times! But who's counting?)

FIVE BAGS OF CANDY!

One by one, day by day, the Halloween icons appear in the scene, trailed by that one poor misinformed trick-or-treater, still sadly unsatisfied, hopefully following the red devils, screechy witches, and toothy vampires to the doorbell, until he at last he gets his long-anticipated reward.

Children who know the tune to "The Twelve Days of Christmas" will get a pre-tricking treat out of singing along with this one, and if they don't already know how to count to twelve, they will after all the incidental learning as they sing this repetitive rhyming and rhythmic song. And for that October holiday, enjoy the fun of the proceedings portrayed in jolly holiday style by illustrator Colleen Madden.

And for a little reader treats, there are 30 comic stickers in the back of the book. And at the very end everyone gets to shout out, "HAPPY HALLOWEEN!"

For more fun singing famous recycled folk tunes, read this one along with Lucille Colandro's lilting holiday countdown, There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat! (A Board Book) (Read my review here).

The Stranger Among Us! E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial by Melissa Mathison

It was the week of Halloween.

Elliott wants to play fighting goblins with his brother, but Michael is not interested. So when Elliott hears a strange noise outside, he decides to do his own goblin hunting solo.

Following some very odd footprints, clearly not made by a coyote, he comes upon a creature that looks like a goblin.

It's definitely not a coyote! Elliot thinks.

But Michael and Mom put Elliott's description down to a pre-Halloween imagination. Still, the next day Elliott spots some strangers with odd equipment searching in the woods nearby, and he guesses that they are looking for that goblin he saw.

Elliot had to find the goblin first!

So Elliott leaves a strategic trail of candies from the edge of the woods to their shed and to his room. And the goblin shows at in his house. He looks friendly, so Elliott introduces him to Michael and his sister Gertie. Michael is instantly intrigued, but Gertie has one objection.

"I don't like his feet!"

Still the kids believe that their strange three-toed visitor is a stranded alien, and they all pitch in to help him get home. They show the visitor where they are on Michael's globe, and when the extra-terrestrial spots their phone, he knows what he must do to find his way home.

"Phone home!" he says.

Luckily, it is soon Halloween, when their alien looks like just another trick-or-treater, and the costumed kids help their new friend find his way back home with the help of their suddenly airborne bikes, in a picture book adaptation of the 1982 classic film, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial: The Classic Illustrated Storybook (Pop Classics) (Quirk Books, 2017). For youngsters who have not seen the famous film, this version, illustrated in simple cartoon style by Kim Smith, is not a substitute, but a good introduction of the movie, stressing the kindness of the kids and E.T., the not-so-scary alien invader. With its theme of the kindness of strangers, this story is a great one to open the emotions and imagination of young readers.

For more about this film classic, share this on with E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial from Concept to Classic: The Illustrated Story of the Film and the Filmmakers, 30th Anniversary Edition (Pictorial Moviebook).