Comments on: Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark

puke & cry — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 17:51:17 -0800

Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark Also, 2 and 3. NSFW due to a tasteless header image. You'll have to arrange by date and ascending to view them in proper order.

By: thecjm

thecjm — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:09:45 -0800

These books were the best. The illustrations were great and extra creepy.

By: olya

olya — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:13:37 -0800

I always wanted to read a collection of such stories. I just can imagine how much fun these would be at the camp fire.. Anyone has any good stories?

By: puke & cry

puke & cry — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:19:31 -0800

This still gives me goosebumps.

By: Senator

Senator — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:23:04 -0800

Never seen Marilyn Manson before?

By: Rhaomi

Rhaomi — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:25:33 -0800

I loved these as a kid! These, Goosebumps, and Shivers. (let, let, let the mailman give you cold, clammy, SHIVERS SHIVERS SHIVERS) Anyway, this is a great find, puke & cry. It's a shame the navigation isn't better... And olya, I've got a transcription of my favorite scary story from this series in this older comment. Creepy artwork and all!

By: Science!

Science! — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:41:03 -0800

My dad had the first of these books when I was a kid. It scared the everlivingshit out of me. Then a few years later I came across the other books and thought, "Meh." I haven't read the stories in years, thanks.

By: basicchannel

basicchannel — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:45:23 -0800

I loved these books as a child. Thanks.

By: olya

olya — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:57:03 -0800

Rhaomi: awesome, thank you! how come all the pictures are stylized in the same manner?

By: jrockway

jrockway — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 19:03:52 -0800

The header image is NSFW? Where do you work, at an elementary school?

By: mr_book

mr_book — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 19:12:41 -0800

The header image is NSFW? Where do you work, at an elementary school? I agree. They don't have females where you work?

By: puke & cry

puke & cry — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 19:18:50 -0800

The header image is a large breasted anime women. I guess if that's ok with you guys, I need to work where you do. I thought is was appropriate to give a warning to people that don't work in such liberal workplaces.

By: olya

olya — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 19:27:17 -0800

puke & cry: definitely NSFW where I work - for that warning, thank you. (reading from home, but had this issue before...) my workplace blocks LCBO (liquor board of ontario) for the following reasons: "SmartFilter blocked this website because it contains the following subjects: Alcohol". like I can drink through my monitor... and now I can't find where to pick up a bottle of wine for dinner.

By: silby

silby — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 19:59:05 -0800

When I read these books as a kid, they ended up freaking me out so much that I had my mom put them away so they couldn't tempt me again. They might not scare me any more, but I'm not sure I want to risk it...

By: Thin Lizzy

Thin Lizzy — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 20:12:27 -0800

Puke and cry, that image is the one that scared/scared me when I was little! And much like silby, I hid them so if anyone ever found out how much it scared me, they wouldn't be able to taunt me with it. I recently re-bought the series when I needed to design some scary monsters. I still had to thumb through and peek at each corner so that skull woman wouldn't sneak up or jump out at me. and maybe I didn't scroll all the way down this time either...

By: agropyron

agropyron — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 20:54:25 -0800

Hm, I remember reading a book with illustrations by the same artist. One of the pictures freaked me the hell out. I still think of it now and then. The story was about a kid who goes into a Native American tomb, and somehow gets trapped in the darkness, and he hears some dry bony thing coming up on him. Then it eats him. The illustration had a withered-looking thing with a beak or something. Anyone remember that story and what book it's in? I didn't see it in these three.

By: puke & cry

puke & cry — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 21:10:06 -0800

All of the was done by Stephen Gammell. I'm not familiar with the story you're referring to though.

By: puke & cry

puke & cry — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 21:11:51 -0800

All of the art

By: agropyron

agropyron — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 21:21:26 -0800

Might have been someone with a similar style, or an imitator, since it looks like those are the only three Scary Story-type books he did. Great links. I love the illustrations.

By: cortex

cortex — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 21:23:48 -0800

Oh my god. I am in elementary school again. The art in these struck me as just wonderfully, irresponsibly scary and awesome at the time—I couldn't believe the school library actually stocked them on purpose. And I think they had a habit of disappearing. "It was then," moaned zombie Jesus, "that I carried you..."

By: hifiparasol

hifiparasol — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 00:29:52 -0800

When I was younger I used to hang out with a friend who was extremely good at telling scary stories that freaked me out. He once had me convinced that there was a poltergeist in his home, which, in the dead of night, would run up and down the stairs at superhuman speeds. Then he invited me over for a sleepover, fell asleep early, and left me awake in his bedroom, too scared to go to the bathroom because I was convinced I heard rapid-fire thumping noises coming from the stairs. This was the best one he ever came up with (told entirely from memory, since it still keeps me up at night): Susie and her mother had just moved into a new house. When Susie first got into her new bedroom, she found that the old owners had left a picture on the wall: A highly stylized painting of a small dog with huge eyes -- the kind of eyes that always seem to be looking at you, no matter where you stand in the room. She didn't like it and tried to take it down. But it was stuck fast to the wall. As she helped her mother and the movers bring all the boxes in, she noticed something else strange. The painting of the dog was in every room in the house. There were even paintings in the hallways and the bathrooms. She mentioned it to her mother. "What? What are you talking about?" Susie's mom asked. The walls were bare, she said. Susie laughed about it and pretended she was joking, because she didn't know what else to do. But she kept seeing the paintings, and it seemed like the little dog's huge eyes were watching her no matter where she went. But the scariest one was in her bedroom. She could feel it looking at her even when here eyes were closed. One night, she couldn't get to sleep. She was afraid of the paintings. To take her mind off them, she got a book from her bookshelf and began to read. Her mother was asleep. The house was dark. But after a while, she couldn't help herself. As scared as she was to look at the little dog, she was more scared to turn her back to it. So there, in the middle of the night, with the house silent, she looked up at it. The dog barked twice. Susie died of fright.

By: Faint of Butt

Faint of Butt — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 05:02:07 -0800

Oh, yes. This series traumatized me as a child. Nowadays, perhaps the stories themselves seem a little tamer, but Gammell's illustrations are still some of the best, creepiest and most atmospheric horror art I've ever seen. To Amazon!

By: Servo5678

Servo5678 — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 07:36:53 -0800

I still have these books from my childhood. They're packed away in a box in my closet. Not because I want to read them again, but because this way I know where they are and they can't get me.

By: aletheia

aletheia — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 09:09:10 -0800

Oh man, I also loved these! Now I've got go figure out where I stored them.

By: churl

churl — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 11:56:13 -0800

Yesss. I definitely remember these illustrations better than the stories.

By: aftermarketradio

aftermarketradio — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 08:11:17 -0800

Have you checked out the imgdump site header now? I think someone there is reading the green and blue.

By: cortex

cortex — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 08:17:08 -0800

Ha! That's awesome. I assign imgdump one point.

By: puke & cry

puke & cry — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 23:47:12 -0800

Heh, that's pretty good. A+ to whoever did that.