(3 minute read)

When I was eight, I “borrowed” my brother’s book about scary mythological creatures. It was like an encyclopedia of all scary things; vampires waiting at your windows, a ghostly head dripping blood through the floorboards, sirens calling innocent sailors to crash on the rocks so they could devour them… It terrified me, but I loved this book! I pawed at its pages every night, taking in all the weird and wonderful tales. I remember each page vividly, and the stories stuck with me ever since…

When we think of children's stories, we often imagine moral lessons, friendly characters, and happily-ever-after endings. These stories provide comfort, reassurance, and a sense of stability for young readers. They also have a purpose: to teach valuable life lessons about kindness, friendship, and perseverance, and to show a simple world where problems are always solved.

However, children, like everyone else, have complex emotions and experiences that can't always be neatly packaged into sweet, safe narratives. Children enjoy a wide range of stories, including dark, weird, unsettling, or even frightening ones. Just think of the terribly weird things that happen in your favourite Roald Dahl story (George's Marvellous Medicine!), the disgusting habits of Fungus the Bogeyman, exploring the woods and monsters in Where the Wild Things Are, or ye olde warnings about wolves in Grandma's clothing from your favourite fairy tale…

These darker stories serve a very different purpose from the safe ones. Children are naturally curious about the world around them, and as they grow, they encounter challenges, fears, and uncertainties. Darker stories often acknowledge feelings such as loss, fear, and adversity. 

It’s true that spooky stories may seem inappropriate for children at first glance, but when carefully crafted, these stories can also play a valuable role in a child's reading diet. They provide children with an opportunity to confront their fears and anxieties in a safe, comfortable setting. By experiencing these feelings through fiction, children can learn how to cope with strong emotions and build resilience.

Just like adults, children's lives are far from simple. They experience moments of joy and sadness, bravery and fear, love and hate. By offering more diverse stories, we empower children to become more compassionate, resilient, and emotionally intelligent individuals. 

Whether my early experience with my brother’s book of ghosts and vampires had any long-term effects, I can’t say, but (yes, we may be biased) we believe that Monsters aren’t that scary AND they can be a lot of fun too! 

We asked members of the Teach Your Monster Team for their favourite spooky, dark and weird children's books and here's what they came up with...

Dracula: A BabyLit by Jennifer Adams and Alison Oliver

The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales by Lane Smith and John Scieszka

The Wolves in the Walls by Neil Gaiman and Dave Mc Kean

Funnybones by Janet and Allan Ahlberg

Meg and Mog by Helen Nicoll and Jan Pienkowski

Haunted House by Jan Pienkowski

Room on the Broom by Julia Donaldson and Alex Scheffer

Nightmare Before Christmas by Tim Burton

The Dark by Lemony Snickett and Jon Klasson

How to Make Friends with a Ghost by Rebecca Green

For slightly older readers, Jill Murphy's The Worst Witch and Angela Summer-Bodenburg's The Little Vampire had a few fans!

Kay Leathers, Contributor at Teach Your Monster.

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash