I’ve never been a fan of scary books or stories. I wouldn’t say they cause me to have nightmares, but they come close. About as close as I’ve gotten to those in the past would be the Castle episodes set at Halloween. Episode 2 of Season 2 revolves around a murder investigation that takes place during Halloween, featuring a victim dressed as a vampire. The episode is filled with Halloween-themed elements and costumes. That’s about as scary as I want to get! Also, I need to take my scary stuff with a healthy dose of humor, and Castle always provided that (well, almost always.)

I find classic fairy tales to be scary enough. Look how many of them have witches or evil stepmothers. Otherwise, I don’t really have a favorite Halloween story.

It’s funny, except for candy, I don’t think much about Halloween. Consequently, my absolute favorite short story is not a Halloween tale. It is “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson. It isn’t Halloween related, but its twist is perfectly gruesome.

I have always enjoyed The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving in all of its forms – short stories, movies, cartoons, everything. It’s the perfect mix of romance, superstition, a horse gone mad, and a madman gone hysterical. It’s still my favorite.

My very favorite “scary” book is Ammie, Come Home by the late, great Barbara Michaels. A modern (well, 1960’s) mystery/romance/ghost story, it’s set in a prosaic townhome located in well-ordered Georgetown, Washington, D.C.–hardly the place anyone would expect to find a threatening haunting. It’s a tad dated for contemporary readers but not enough so to detract from the story. With Ammie, Michaels has written what I consider the perfect gothic romance…heck, the perfect novel.

I have always been a huge fan of Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven”. I may have gone around for weeks croaking the word “Nevermore!”, which I’d never heard before reading that story. His “Tell-tale Heart” comes in a close second of my favorite scary stories. What I love about “The Raven” is that the violence is off the page, and the scariness comes from the word cadence and story tension. In Tell-tale Heart, at the time I’d never read anything purported to be written by a madman. The point of view character made the story.

When I was in high school, I read On the Beach, about the aftermath of a nuclear war. It scared the caca out of me, and with what’s going on in the world today, it’s still an all too real possibility. I’ve reached that point in my life where I don’t want to read scary books.