The Kill (The Forbidden Game Series Book 3) - L.J. Smith

The Forbidden Game Book 1 - The Hunter
The Forbidden Game Book 2 - The Chase

I'll be honest, I didn't fully read this book. I skimmed through it. It's so much better than The Chase was, but either that book killed any desire I had to finish reading the trilogy again or I don't love these books as much as I used to. Or both. Either way, I really wanted to get it over with so I could move onto other things. I don't like having that attitude, but it's how I felt.

The Kill begins with out favorite, bland group of friends on a plane to Pittsburgh, to Jenny's grandfather's house, in search of clues that will help them find Tom and Zach. (I personally don't think those two are worth the trouble, but what do I know?) Jenny left a note for her parents to tell them she hoped she would return and, oh, by the way, she stole $600 from them. So in addition to being a runaway, she's also a thief.

While Jenny naps on the plane, she has a strange dream about Joyland Park, an amusement park she remembers from her childhood. This becomes her first clue in her quest to find her missing boyfriend and cousin. Michael also has a dream about Summer, the friend they lost in the first book, but Audrey and Jenny silence him before he can further explain it since he probably has nothing of value to say anyway.

Eventually they arrive at Jenny's grandfather's house, which has been empty for ten years, apparently. How convenient. Now it's time to break in! Good thing they were able to smuggle a crowbar, hammer and screwdriver onto the plane with them! (I know this was written when airport security was more lax, but seriously?) Unfortunately, they notice a warning that the house is protected by a security alarm, so Jenny comes up with the idea to call her grandfather's old housekeeper, who STILL just happens to be taking care of the place (but she won't be home for 9 hours). I don't understand 1. Why this house hasn't been sold yet and 2. Why someone is still taking care of it. No one has lived there for TEN YEARS. I realize I'm being nitpicky, but I can't get past this.

As Michael is whining that he wants ice cream, Jenny notices a bus with an advertisement for Joyland Park on it and she decides that's where they'll go to kill time until the housekeeper returns home, since she had a dream about it and maybe it's a clue. It turns out Jenny was right, as she notices various things about the amusement park's attractions seem "off." As Jenny plays a fishing game, she catches Julian's gold ring on her line and decides it's time to leave. Seems like the opposite of what she should be doing after getting a huge lead like that, but okay, sure.

Jenny cons the housekeeper into giving her the key to her grandfather's house and the code to disable the security alarm. Once inside, the group goes down into the basement, where Jenny searches for her grandfather's journal. She finds an entry discussing runes and tells everyone they need to carve them on a door, stain them and then say their names. Afterwards, they can open the door to another realm. Sounds like a good time. Or not. Either way, they go through with it and when they step through the door, they find themselves back in Joyland Park - or rather, a twisted, nightmare version of it.

Jenny, Dee, Audrey and Michael decide to head to the mine ride to get picks to use as weapons, in case they need to defend themselves. Now fully armed, they attempt to backtrack out of the mine, only...It's changed. The way they came in is not the same as the way they're heading out. No one ever would have guessed that something like this would happen. They are now lost in a real mine shaft and Jenny, genius that she is, falls into a gap in the floor and into another cavern. All alone. Until she hears Julian's voice.

Julian agrees to give Jenny a hint about the new game, if she "pays the price." Here we go again. So she kisses him and he passes a gold coin to her. Jenny remembers something she saw at the real Joyland Park. "Collect three gold doubloons, and be the first to set foot on...Treasure Island." I suppose, at this point, it's worth noting that Julian leaves Jenny trapped in the cave, the other Shadow Men attempt to kill her and Julian rescues her and nurses her back to health, visibly shaken. It shows his humanity, for once. They have a nice chat, where Julian explains how Shadow Men come into existence. Their names are carved onto a runestave. If you destroy the carving, they'll disappear. The moment between them passes almost as quickly as it began and Julian releases Jenny so she can continue playing his game. At least he's fair.

Once outside and reunited with her friends, Jenny heads to the arcade in search of a gold doubloon. She decides to try her luck with a fortune telling machine and she recognizes the animatronic wizard inside as...Her grandfather. So that's where he disappeared to when the Shadow Men took him ten years ago. Julian did tell her the shadow version of Joyland Park was created back then. Now we know why. A fortune comes out directing everyone to the Fun House.

The only thing worth mentioning about the Fun House is that the friends find Summer, alive, inside. She didn't die during the game in the first book, which means Julian isn't quite the monster he pretends to be. Don't get me wrong, he's still horrible. But he's slightly less horrible and at least he's better than Tom.

When they finally receive the third coin, Jenny admits to herself that, in a way, she loves Julian. With all three coins in their possession, the group crosses the bridge that leads to Treasure Island. Inside the lighthouse at the end of the bridge, as promised, are Tom and Zach. Julian appears and in a scene straight out of Phantom of the Opera's Final Lair sequence, he grants Jenny and her friends their freedom and demands Tom get her out of there before he changes his mind. Just one problem though...

The other Shadow Men are there now and they still want Jenny after all these years. Julian screams at the Shadow Men to stop and they tell him the only way they can let her go is if someone else takes her place. Tom, Dee, Zach, Audrey and Michael all volunteer as tribute, because apparently, Jenny is "worth more" than any of them and to be honest, I really don't get it because she's the most boring protagonist in any book I've ever read. Summer attempts to offer her life in exchange for Jenny's, but she faints before she has a chance and she probably should have really been killed off in the first book because she adds nothing to this story.

Jenny, obviously, doesn't allow her friends to sacrifice themselves for her and agrees to go with the Shadow Men. Until Julian punches one of them in the mouth. He yells at her to run through the door, back to her own world. Jenny catches a glimpse of a runestave in one of the creature's hands and then, a knife pierces the name on it. Julian's name. She runs to Julian and her friends help her drag him through the door back into her grandfather's house. Then Julian dies. Jenny chooses to wear his ring. It's corny. I wish it had been Tom who died instead. The book ends with the possibility of Julian's name being written onto the runestave again one day...

So here's the thing. L.J. Smith said she plans on writing a followup to the original trilogy and I hope she is actually the one writing it because the followup to The Secret Circle trilogy was ghostwritten and it ruined everything I loved about those books. However, I hope if she does write another book, it doesn't follow the plot she already teased where Jenny is marrying Tom in a week (WHY?) and Julian comes back to play another game that involves brainwashing her and all her friends. I think that's the most frustrating part for me. After everything they've been through, after Jenny has beaten Julian at his own games three times, he still comes back to try to force his way into her life? I thought at the end of The Kill, things wrapped up nicely for them. If he comes back and starts screwing with her life again, it erases any progress he made towards being a decent man. I'm all for bringing Julian back, but do it in a way where Jenny chooses to be with him because she wants to.

Summer, Fireworks, and My Corpse by Otsuichi

Let's start off by issuing a SPOILER WARNING because I will be spoiling the entirety of the title story. I was trying to figure out why sometimes I'm willing to spoil things and others I'm not and I think when I really like or dislike something, I have a tendency to want to discuss it more, whereas if I don't have strong feelings either way, I want to get to the point and move on.

Summer, Fireworks and My Corpse is told from the point of view of a 9-year-old girl named Satsuki, who happens to be dead. This is an interesting premise, until you realize her corpse isn't present for half the events in the story and...She's not a ghost. So how is she narrating details she didn't even witness?

Before her death, Satsuki was sitting on a tree branch with her friend, Yayoi, while waiting for Yayoi's brother, Ken, to join them. Yayoi confessed that she had feelings for her 11-year-old brother, at which point, Satsuki did, too, so that her friend wouldn't feel embarrassed. In what must have been a fit of jealousy, Yayoi pushed Satsuki from the tree branch they were sitting on and the fall killed her. Ken ran to them after hearing the branches snap and asked his sister what happened. Of course, she lied and said Satsuki fell, then begged him not to tell their mother. Ken agreed to help his sister hide the body and from this point on, it's a constant back and forth of, "Oh my God, we almost got caught, we'd better find a new place to hide the body." Yayoi is terrified and Ken is excited, taking joy in covering up the death of Satsuki.

Conveniently for the two children, a series of kidnappings had occurred in the region, and they hoped that people would assume the same happened to Satsuki. One night, while attempting to dispose of the body for good, 19-year-old Midori, who happened to be a friend of the siblings' family, caught them in the act. Instead of turning them in, she told Ken it would all be taken care of, as she's "quite used to" getting rid of bodies by now, revealing that Midori was the one kidnapping the children (who all resembled Ken...). She stashed Satsuki's body in the ice cream factory she worked at, with her own victims. There, Satsuki would play Kagome, Kagome with them. Good to know that, at least in death, she was able to make some decent friends.

This story was so frustrating to read because 1. The children were almost caught numerous times and Ken always found a way to talk his way out of it, while acting incredibly suspicious and 2. They got away with their crimes. Summer, Fireworks, and My Corpse goes on for way longer than it should and it's incredibly repetitive. I was actually planning to read all three stories in the book and review them, but I was so turned off by the first one that I could not motivate myself to read the rest of them, so I decided one was enough and maybe one day, I'll come back to the book and read the other two. But I doubt it.

The Sinking City

The Sinking City is a 2019 horror adventure game where you play as Charles Reed, a private investigator, who travels to the city of Oakmont in search of answers about the strange visions he's been having. Upon his arrival, he gets tangled up in the city's various messes, including a feud between Robert Throgmorton and the Innsmouthers. Oh, and there's that little matter of the EOD, newly rebranded as "Everyone's Obvious Duty," and the fact that it seems like something is about to rise from the sea. No big deal.

The Sinking City is heavily influenced by Lovecraft's racism. And Trump's, actually (you'll find two memos in the game that reference his two favorite catchphrases). I really appreciate the fact that the developers give you an opportunity to confront a specific character about their bigotry. It made me rethink the way I viewed the Innsmouthers, too. If you've read The Shadow Over Innsmouth, your feelings were probably the same as mine. Innsmouthers are hostile and can't be trusted. You remember what happened at the Gilman House, right? But the Innsmouth folk actually don't seem that bad in The Sinking City. In fact, I found myself protecting them throughout the game, even when it was against my better judgment sometimes. You'll have to make a lot of tough decisions while playing The Sinking City, you'll always question whether you're doing the right thing because no one is 100% innocent and sometimes by trying to do the right thing, you'll have to make some really bad choices.

The game has a lot of similar elements to the Call of Cthulhu game that was released not too long ago, but The Sinking City was definitely more enjoyable to play. I mean, I actually finished this game. There are a series of main quests that send you around the city, where you're usually expected to talk to various people, go through the archives (at the police station, university, etc.) and put clues together so you can further your investigation, examine a crime scene and collect evidence so you can begin retrocognition and piece together the events that happened there...And that's basically it. You do fight some monsters along the way, but combat itself isn't that interesting and neither is the variety of monsters you deal with (although I will say I stopped doing side quests early on, until I received a shotgun, because I saw one of the monsters and ran away).

While completing your main quests and side quests, you'll earn XP so you can upgrade Charles' mind, vigor and combat proficiency. I actually maxed out mind and vigor first, as the rewards for those two branches were more helpful. I recommend starting with "smart packing." I really don't know how much the extra XP skills help, but I would acquire those next, then alternate between higher health and sanity, followed by upgrades for the shotgun and then the skills that give you a chance to save crafting materials. After that, it's just whatever you think is the least useless.

Completing side quests will help you max out your skills, but as I mentioned before, the problem I found was that in the beginning of the game, many of the available side quests had monsters that were too difficult for me to fight at that point, so I had to come back to them later on. Around chapter 8, when I decided to do all the side quests at once, I started to reach the point I always reach when I play any game. I just wanted it to be over. I enjoyed The Sinking City, but now I wanted to move on. And I 100% blame it on the fact that I tried to rush through the side quests and some of them were not enjoyable for me, so it felt like I was forcing myself to play. (I suggest completing them as you pick them up, if you're able to.) Some of the side quests, like All That Glitters, require you to enter infested zones. I almost gave up in the middle of that one because entering those areas stressed me out. I completed every sidequest except Functional Brain Cylinders and the Worshippers of the Necronomicon DLC (which is supposed to be very good) because I was not about to go through the infested zones again.

I have a list of pros and cons about things I have not already discussed...It's interesting, the list of cons is pretty long, but I genuinely enjoyed this game and would recommend playing it. Don't let these lists fool you.

Let's start with the pros:

1. I feel like the game is fair. Yes, you have limited supplies, but crafting items respawn, so you can always scavenge for more if you're low on items. (There's an exploit you can use if you want to gather items faster, which I'll mention later on in this post.)
2. Infested areas are clearly marked, so if you're like me and you want no part of them, you won't have to worry about accidentally wandering into one.
3. If you're low on first aid kits and antipsychotics, you can always go back to your hotel room and get more.

And my extremely long list of cons, that by no means took away from my enjoyment of the game (slight spoilers here):

1. I would have preferred an actual mini map instead of the weird bar-map going across the top of the screen.
2. There was a glitch in the hospital where most people were floating in the air (see above picture).
3. This one is personal, but I couldn't handle the underwater segments. That goes for any game that forces you into the ocean.
4. There was a glitch where I tried to get out of the boat at the dock, went flying into the air and immediately died upon landing.
5. There was a glitch where someone was fishing and as I approached them, they flew off and disappeared.
6. Travel can be tedious, between running through the city or traveling by boat, until fast travel points are unlocked.
7. Enemies respawn, which kind of sucks if you think you've cleared an area, leave and then check the map only to find out there are still clues there. (I made that mistake once. Never again.)
8. Extremely long load screens.
9. Retrocognition was difficult sometimes because everything is some shade of blue, which made it hard to find my way around.
10. There was a glitch where, upon loading, I clipped through the ground and had to reload the game.
11. The decisions you make throughout the game have no real consequences and only slightly affect the final chapter of the game. They don't affect the endings at all.
12. When there's a sanity meter in a game, I'll always compare it to Eternal Darkness and The Sinking City's sanity effects couldn't live up to everything Eternal Darkness throws at you. This was one area of the game that really did disappoint me.
13. The game does not warn you when the point of no return is, which means it's possible that you won't be able to complete your side quests. SPOILER: The point of no return is during Into the Depths, when you've completed the seal and return to St. Michael's Church.
14. No NG+.
15. There's only one "real" mandatory "boss" battle and SPOILER you never fight the Old Ones. Not that you really could, anyway. 
16. You're able to choose one of three endings, but they're all extremely short and I felt a bit disappointed that after all I'd been through in the game, that was all I got for it.
17. There's no chapter select upon completion, which means that if you want to go back and see what happens if you make different choices, you have to play through the entire game again.

I was so surprised to see this poster of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. I actually have this poster hanging in my bedroom, but the image is flipped.

Before I end this post, I want to discuss a few things, all relating to an item exploit posted to reddit that will allow you to quickly stock up on crafting materials, including rags, metal scraps and cordite (which can be hard to come by). This was incredibly helpful and it made the game so much easier for me once I realized the trunk in that house gives you a ton of crafting items, and you can just walk in and out immediately, over and over.

Unfortunately, when I was farming items there once, this happened. (I did figure out what that symbol means. The building has loaded. I'm an idiot.) If you want to avoid monsters and townspeople unleashing monsters onto the city of Oakmont (and you don't mind traveling a bit further), you can go to the house where Call of the Ocean is located. The chest right up the stairs seems to give you an infinite amount of crafting materials if you enter and exit, without having to worry about enemies. It actually seems like most Letters to Oakmont locations have chests you can exploit. Just be cautious when entering the buildings because for some (Disgusting Exaltation), monster spawns are random. 

So, final verdict on The Sinking City? It's littered with glitches, but it's a genuinely enjoyable experience. It can be a bit slow and there's not much payoff at the end, but I like that it was sort of Hammett meets Lovecraft and I thought it was interesting to see a new side to the Innsmouthers. I didn't find the game scary when I first started playing it, but the longer it went on, the more it got under my skin. If you like horror games and you don't mind a bit of a slow burn, give it a chance when it goes on sale.

Fall Candles From Candles by Victoria

I know candles aren't technically horror related, but for me, they're part of the Fall experience, which is the best time for horror. Reading a scary book? Watching a scary movie? Playing a scary game? A good way to enhance your experience is to dim the lights and burn some candles.

I started ordering from Candles by Victoria six years ago and since then, I've been buying candles exclusively from them. Victoria's candles are just better than brands like Yankee or BBW. The scent throw is always strong, the candles never lose their scent, no matter how long you burn them. Victoria's decorative candles are to die for. And I love that she genuinely enjoys what she does, you can see how passionate she is about her business by watching her vlogs on Youtube. And she's constantly creating new candles and scents, so there's definitely something for everyone. Each candles is made when you place your order, they're not sitting around on a shelf forever, waiting to be purchased. This can sometimes mean longer processing times during sales or holidays, but trust me, it's worth it. Victoria is amazing at what she does.

As far as scents go, for me, personally, I prefer bakery and Fall scents. All year. Those are my favorites, they put me in a good mood. I love to open my windows in October and let the crisp, Fall air inside while burning a candle and reading a book. That is my happy place, there's nothing better. And since it's almost that time of year again, I recently placed an order for more of Victoria's Fall scented candles. (I also received one from my mom as a gift.) I've actually already ordered several of these in the past and I loved them so much, I had to have them again.

Since I'm bad at describing scents, I won't even attempt to. All the scent descriptions are coming straight from the website.

Sweet Treat - Pumpkin Cheesecake - $15.50, 15 oz.

This candle has two scents to it, beginning with Spiced Pumpkin Chutney on the bottom and a layer of cream cheese on top. I love this candle. Pumpkin scents are some of my favorites (I also love apple and cinnamon and Victoria has a scent called Pumpkin Apple Cinnamon Bread that is incredible), but the main reason I bought this is because of how it's decorated. It's topped with a really cute pumpkin and wax crumbles and it's sprinkled with cinnamon. I know it's a candle and it's meant to be burned, but I think this is really nice as a fall decoration, too. I stopped buying decorative candles for a while because I never wanted to burn them, but all the candles I'll be talking about have such a strong cold throw, you don't even really have to light them if you don't want to.

Maple Butter Pumpkin Frap - $25, 24 oz.

This is one of the candles I've purchased in the past. It's a mix of maple butter and pumpkin frappuccino and it has pumpkin embeds sprinkled with cinnamon. This is a great coffee scent, especially if you don't enjoy straight coffee, the pumpkin helps dilute it.

Pumpkin Patch Coffee Cup Cutie - $22.50, 18 oz.

Victoria's Coffee Cup Cutie line is made up of candles housed in, you guessed it, coffee mugs. The Pumpkin Patch scent consists of pumpkins, apple cider and leaves. I've already said, apple and pumpkin are two of my favorite scents. When they're mixed together, it's magic. This candle is topped with pine cone, acorn, pumpkin and leaf embeds and the rim of the cup is lined with glitter. Of all the candles I just ordered, as far as scent goes, this is probably my favorite.

Dutch Apple Pie Coffee Cup Cutie - $22.50, 18 oz.

This candle is in the scent Dutch Apple Crunch, a blend of vanilla and apple pie. It is the perfect apple scent. It's decorated with wax crumbles, apple embeds, a scoop of ice cream and "caramel" drizzle (I'm pretty sure it just looks like caramel drizzle and isn't meant to smell like caramel, all the wax is in the Dutch Apple Crunch scent). And this one also has glitter around the cup.

Comfort Pumpkin Gingerbread Splash - $18.50, 16 oz.

The Comfort candles come in bowls (a lid is included) and they're adorable. Especially this little guy. This is another repeat candle for me, I just can't get enough of that gingerbread man. This candle comes in two layers, the first is Buttery Gingerbread, followed by Spiced Pumpkin Chutney (there it is again!). There are some maple crumbles, pumpkin embeds and, of course, a cute gingerbread man bathing in all of it.

Comfort Caramel Gingered Apple Crisp - $18.50, 16 oz.

Another repeat purchase. This candle's scent is made up of maple, caramel, ginger and apple cinnamon. It's topped with apple embeds, gold sprinkles and glitter. Again, I love apple scents and this one has cinnamon as well, so you know I had to order it again.

Design a Candle - $30, 32 oz.

This is the candle my mom gave me and I was really excited because I've purchased several of these candles before, but I never realized they have a Halloween design style (I always chose Fall). She ordered it in the scents Bonfire Bliss and Country Bumpkin, which shows how well she knows me because I've ordered create-a-scent candles in those two scents at least five times, they're my absolute favorites to mix. (Bonfire Bliss is the best Fall scent ever, trust me.) These candles come in a large bowl and they're customizable. You can choose two scents to mix (or you can just choose one scent that you really like). Then you choose the design style (ranging from seasons to holidays, etc.), color, whether or not you want glitter on it and you can create a name for it. My mom obviously chose the Halloween style for my candle and I love it because it has little skulls and Jack-O'-Lantern embeds. Victoria sells wax melts in addition to candles, in all kinds of shapes, but not those two. I really hope she'll add them to her line at some point because she obviously has the molds for them and I would buy them. Over and over.

That's it for this order! I can't wait for the colder weather to get here so I can start burning these candles. Until then, they're a nice headstart on my Fall decorating.

The Blair Witch Project Rewatch

I'll admit it, I really didn't like The Blair Witch Project when I was younger. I remember being unimpressed by how little happened in the film and thinking it wasn't scary at all, for a movie everyone was claiming was the scariest thing to ever exist. People were obsessed with this movie when it was released. My mom had a friend who, even years later, swore the movie was real. Blair Witch hysteria.

I decided to give the film another chance because I'm older now and my thought process has changed a bit. I wasn't afraid of the woods when I was a kid, but I am now. I think that changed after I saw Wrong Turn. That movie wasn't scary, but it was the first time I realized, "Hey, something really bad could happen in the woods." I also just really enjoy found footage films now (Gonjiam Haunted Asylum is my favorite). I went into watching The Blair Witch Project again with an open mind, hopeful that I would be able to appreciate whatever it had to offer.

In case you somehow don't know what this movie is about, allow me to tell you (I have a ton of notes here, but I'm going to scrap them because I don't want to give major spoilers). In October of 1994, three film students disappeared in Maryland while filming a documentary about the Blair Witch. A year later, their footage was found, though the students never were.

As is usually the case in films like this, everything starts out lighthearted enough, until one night while they're sleeping in the woods, they hear noises outside their tent, including cackling. This escalates each night, until their very last night in the woods. Throughout their stay, everyone slowly begins to break down and become hysterical, causing them to turn on each other. That's their downfall because they stop working together to find their way out of the woods (with one of the two guys kicking their map into the creek because he thought it was "useless"). Listening to them scream at each other (for most of the movie) stressed me out and I couldn't wait for it to stop.

So, after rewatching The Blair Witch Project 500 years later, has my opinion changed? Kind of. I think it's definitely longer than it needed to be (and it's not even that long to begin with) and my mind began wandering towards the end. However, I did think it was interesting and not nearly as boring as I remember it being. All the screaming was too much for me though and I really just wanted it to be over. I'm not mad that (SPOILERS) we never see the Blair Witch or what exactly happened to the three film students, I think the movie is still effectively "scary" with what we do see (such as the creepy rock piles and effigies). I'll probably never watch it again, but I don't hate it.

And because I can never post about one topic without mentioning another, I wanted to say that I see so much of this movie in Resident Evil 7, in the found footage VHS tape of the Baker estate (the one from the demo). It's especially obvious in the scene where you find Andre facing the wall in the basement. I thought this when I first played the game, and now I'm even more convinced that the developers must have taken inspiration from The Blair Witch Project.

Pumpkin Cinema by Nathaniel Tolle

Pumpkin Cinema is a Halloween lover's dream. If you're looking for the perfect film to celebrate your favorite holiday, all you need to do is open this book to any page and you're set. I'm going to say the same thing I always say, no one can convey the feeling of Fall and Halloween the way Ray Bradbury did, but Nathaniel Tolle comes very close in his introduction and I'm impressed. I almost forgot I was reading it on an 80+ degree day in July (I know, this post is going up in August). Nathaniel really gets the spirit of Halloween. I would love to go to a Halloween party he was throwing because I bet it would be the most fun, ever. And I'm saying this as a person with social anxiety who doesn't do parties or social gatherings.

The book is organized alphabetically, beginning with movies and ending with "fun-sized" films and  TV specials/episodes, as well as various top 5 lists. Included for each film are the title (of course), year of release, director, cast, length, rating, a brief synopsis and art for some features (including lobby cards, film stills, press kit photos, a TV GUIDE - where did he even get this??, postcards, promo photos and DVD covers). You're given all the information you need to make an informed decision on your creature feature for Halloween night.

Nathaniel Tolle followed some strict guidelines when he was writing this book, because there are so many creepy movies to choose from, somehow they needed to be narrowed down. These are the rules he followed:

1. It has to be fun to watch.
2. It cannot repeatedly present seasons, locations, and weather that contrast with autumn. (This explains why The Thing, one of the greatest horror films ever made, isn't included.)
3. It cannot have a running time of over two hours.
4. It cannot be mean spirited and cruel.
5. If it is not scary, then it has to be directly associated with Halloween.
6. If it is a sequel, it has to make sense to those who have never seen the original.
7. It must have a fairly quick pace. (Nosferatu and Dracula are excluded for being boring. Nathaniel doesn't use that word, but I am, even though, artistically, I appreciate Nosferatu. The story of Dracula, regardless of which version it is, has never been interesting to me. So I 100% agree with him here. People will fall asleep if you play either of these films.)

I've seen many of the movies included in Pumpkin Cinema and the ones I would personally recommend are Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, Arsenic and Old Lace, Bride of Frankenstein, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Cabin in the Woods, Daffy Duck's Quackbusters, 1408, Frankenstein, The Halloween Tree, House on Haunted Hill, In the Mouth of Madness, Killer Klowns from Outer Space, The Midnight Hour, the Monster Squad, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Suspiria, Disney's Halloween Treat (I have this, as well as some other Halloween specials on this list, on an old VHS tape that my dad recorded forever ago) and Tom and Jerry's Halloween Special.

If I could add a few films to the book, they would be Horror Hotel, 13 Ghosts, The Fog (the original), The Wolf Man and Oculus (to be fair, that film was probably released after the book was published). And Waxwork! I think it's really interesting that he included Waxwork 2, but not the first film. It's one of the few things I disagree with Nathaniel Tolle on, but I hated the sequel. Waxwork is a fun movie though.

I appreciate the reference made to The Tingler in the plot summary of House on Haunted Hill, as well as discussing William Castle's knack for showmanship (his films were always an event and for House on Haunted Hill, he had a skeleton fly over the audience in the theater). Nathaniel Tolle really knows his film history and it shows with the random trivia he sprinkles throughout the book.

Unfortunately, I have to take this to a more negative place now because as much as I would love to gush about the book and gloss over this one thing, I really can't. I was extremely disappointed to see Clownhouse included in Pumpkin Cinema, given the director's (Victor Salva) past, but at least Nathaniel acknowledges it. I didn't know about it when I bought the DVD around 10 years ago (they actually stopped selling it for a while, I'm sad to see it back on Amazon now), I just knew it was a movie I used to watch when I was a kid and I liked it. But I was reading the message board on IMDB (remember when those still existed?) one day and I learned that Victor Salva was convicted  of sexual misconduct with the 12 year old star of Clownhouse. He videotaped the encounter. And he only spent 15 months in prison. So yeah, after I read that, I got rid of the DVD, as well as my copy of Jeepers Creepers. It's beyond me that Hollywood still allows this man to work. He wasn't just accused of these crimes, he was actually convicted. He plead guilty. He's a horrible, disgusting person. I really don't want this post to become about that man, but I sincerely advise people not to watch any of his films, especially Clownhouse. There are some scenes in that movie that become really disturbing once you know what Victor Salva did to that boy. I know people say to "separate the art from the artist" and as a fan of Lovecraft's work, I understand that concept, to a degree, but when the "art" is a representation of his very real crimes, that becomes impossible.

That aside, I really did enjoy Pumpkin Cinema. As someone who loves Halloween, this book made me really happy. And Nathaniel Tolle has amazing taste in Halloween movies. I also now have an entire list of movies I've never seen before that I want to watch this October. I hope one day he'll write another book with more recent films, and others that didn't make the cut this time around.

The Monster Squad

Disclaimer: This film was released in the 80's and it is not politically correct, at all. Some things will make you cringe. If you're able to put that aside and remember that it's a product of a really weird decade, it's a lot of fun.

The Monster Squad is about a group of kids who really like monsters. They spend their time in school drawing them ("spider with human head") and their time after school in a tree house, talking about them. It's all fun and games until one day, Sean's mom gives him Van Helsing's diary, which she found while browsing at a GARAGE SALE. Someone interested in buying the diary calls and leaves a message for Sean, with his name, Alucard. Sean is a clever kid and almost immediately realizes that "Alucard" is "Dracula" spelled backwards. He gathers his friends to tell them that monsters are real and they're the only ones who can stop them. Teaming up with "Scary German Guy" and Frankenstein's monster, they'll have to fight Dracula, the Wolf Man, the Mummy and "Gill-man" (aka The Creature from the Black Lagoon).

At times, The Monster Squad is so 80's it hurts, but I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing (except for some of the more questionable dialogue throughout the movie). It's like stepping into a time warp. A really fun time warp. There are some great one-liners (I was going to include my favorites, but that would have been 90% of the script) in this film and some insults you would only hear from that decade (or Saved by the Bell, so maybe early 90's, too). The other thing I love about this movie being made in the 80's is that CGI wasn't used for everything back then, so practical FX were used for the monsters and they look beautiful (in a really grotesque, horrifying way).

If you can get a copy of the 20th anniversary edition of the DVD, I highly recommend it. The special features are nice, especially the commentary with the cast members. They offer a lot of insight into the making of the movie and sometimes, it almost feels like you're watching an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 because they do mock some of the more absurd parts of the movie (in a very loving way, of course).

Who would like this film: If you're a fan of monster mashups (like Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein or Penny Dreadful) and Stranger Things, The Monster Squad is the movie for you. It's meant to be a comedy, but I wouldn't recommend it to kids under the age of 10. There are some genuinely scary moments that will probably traumatize younger children.

1. Harold (Scary Stories 3 - More Tales to Chill Your Bones)

I don't even think I need to explain why Harold took the top spot, do I? Look at him. A scarecrow that comes to life and peels the skin off his owner? No thanks.

I know Harold is a scarecrow, not a doll. But it's all the same to me and I've had a fear of dolls ever since I was a kid. Here's a bit of backstory. My parents separated when I was five-years-old and my dad lived in an apartment above my grandmother's house. I was spending the night there, and my aunt and cousins were downstairs. My dad went up to bed and left me downstairs with his evil family, who were watching The Twilight Zone. It was The Living Doll episode. All the lights were out. And once it was over, I had to go up the stairs, in the dark, after watching that damn doll trip someone down a staircase, my family yelling after me, "Watch out for Talky Tina!"I hated that doll and I hated my family. I had nightmares about dolls for years. One Christmas, my mom, for some reason I will never understand, bought me two dolls. I was afraid of them. I was afraid not to sleep with them and I was afraid if I did sleep with them and one was next to me, the other one would feel slighted and kill me. I wish I could say I was making this up, but I'm not.

So yes. Harold is the only story that could possibly take the #1 spot here. It's not because I like the story, it's because this is the scariest story in all three books and it earned its spot at the top of my list.

2. The Drum (More Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark)

The Drum isn't a particularly scary story, but there's something about it that stayed with me.

Two sisters were wandering around outside when they came across a girl with a drum. They desperately wanted the drum, so the girl made a deal with them: If they went home and behaved really badly, she would give it to them. This went on for several days, each time the girl encouraged the sisters to act much worse. Their mother threatened to leave them if they kept acting out.

Finally, one day after they were extremely horrible, they met the girl again to tell her all the things they had done. The girl revealed that she had never intended to actually let them have the drum. The sisters were very upset. When they went home, their mother was nowhere to be found. Instead, there was a woman with glass eyes and a wooden tail.

If you have kids and you want them to behave, just tell them this story. That should calm them down.

3. The Babysitter (Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark)

The Babysitter was the first urban legend I'd ever heard and it's still my favorite. It's about a babysitter (obviously) who keeps receiving weird phone calls from a man who is counting time down, but she doesn't know what happens when time is up. Finally, she calls the operator to find out who is making these calls to her and when the operator calls back, she's told the calls are coming from upstairs and to get out of the house. As she's about to take the children outside, a door opens and she sees a man making his way down the stairs.

Suggested watching: When a Stranger Calls. The original, not the remake. The first 20 minutes of that movie are so intense and terrifying. I honestly didn't like the rest of the movie, but it's worth watching for the opening.

4. The Hook (Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark)

I feel kind of bad, but this won't be the last urban legend to appear on this list. These were my favorite stories growing up and I had to include all of them.

In The Hook, a couple are parked on a hill after their date at the movies. The boy turned the radio on and the couple heard an announcement that a murderer, with a hook for a hand, escaped from a local prison. The girl was scared and wanted to go home, and the boy reluctantly agreed to leave. When they were about to drive away, the girl heard something scratching at her door. Eventually, they arrived at her house and when the boy got out to open the car door for her, he saw a hook hanging on the door handle.

This is a really popular urban legend that's probably been adapted a million times, but there's an episode of Daria called "Legends of the Mall" that parodies it and I recommend it if you're into that sort of thing.

5. High Beams (Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark)

Have you seen the movie Urban Legend? If not, watch the first 15 minutes or so. It's the scariest part of the film and it's based on this legend.

A girl was driving home alone at night and she noticed a truck following her. The driver began to flash their high beams on and off at her and she started to panic, not knowing what they wanted. When she finally pulled into her driveway and yelled for her parents to call the police, the man in the truck got out, carrying a gun in his hand. He explained to the police that in the back seat of the girl's car, there was a man with a knife. Every time the man sat up to attack her, he would flash his high beams so the man would duck back down.

I love stories like this because they could happen. They probably have happened. Urban legends have to start somewhere, right? Always check your back seat before you get in the car.

6. The Wendigo (Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark)

You know, I had no idea what a wendigo was when I was younger, so when I read this story, I really wasn't interested in it. After playing Until Dawn, I learned what they are (cannibalistic creatures) and now I can finally appreciate it.

The Wendigo is about a man who went hunting in Northern Canada, with a Native American as his guide. In their tent, they heard a windstorm, but when the hunter looked outside, everything was calm. Listening closely, he could hear the wind calling his guide's name. The guide was noticeably upset and ran from the tent, leaving the hunter alone. In the morning, he followed the guide's footsteps in the snow, but they abruptly stopped, as if he disappeared into thin air. The hunter left, only to return a year later. The guide was never found and the people at the trading post said maybe the wendigo got him. And there's a bit of a "twist" ending.

7. One Sunday Morning (More Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark)

A woman was running late for Sunday morning mass and took off in a hurry to get to church. When she arrived, she didn't recognize anyone there, except for a woman who died a month earlier. Looking closer, she noticed skeletons in suits and dresses. They were angry and the woman she recognized told her to leave, if she cares for her life. She grabbed her coat and made her way over to the door, hearing footsteps behind her. She started to run, but the corpses grabbed at her, tearing off her coat and hat. She escaped, wondering if it had all been a dream. Later on that day, one of her friends returns her ripped coat and hat, which had been found in the cemetery.

I think the idea of this story is genuinely frightening. What if you were to trespass on something you weren't meant to see? It doesn't have to be a service for the dead, it could be anything. Wrong place, wrong time. That's why One Sunday Morning made my list. Even though this particular instance isn't likely to happen, there are other situations that could end the same way.

8. The Window (More Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark)

The Window is about three siblings (a sister and two brothers) who lived in a house on a hill. One night, the sister was looking out her bedroom window and she saw two small lights moving near the graveyard by the woods. Then the lights began moving closer to the house. As she watched, she noticed it somewhat resembled a man and became very frightened. "She wanted to run from her room. But the door was next to her window. She was afraid the creature would see her and break in before she could escape."

That's all you really need to know about The Window. That quote. It's the reason I don't look out my bedroom window at night. I don't want to know what's out there, and I don't want it knowing I'm in here either.