These stories are short, creepy, and perfect for reading around a campfire when the sky is full of stars.

Roberta Simpson Brown's stories take place in familiar country. Children ride rides at traveling shows. The clang of the locker doors is between-class music at the high school. Parents send their children off to bed with a snack of milk and cookies. There are, though, other... things... in this fictional landscape. Things that want a little snack themselves, and not of the milk-and-cookie variety, either.

There are trees that walk, statues that accuse, and white-faced ticket takers with gentle names like "Dave" who send people on very long journeys. There are fish here that we certainly hope you're never on the other end of the fishing line from. Ms. Brown, an acclaimed storyteller, has put together this collection of original modern-day scary stories.

They're intense, creepy, and perfect for reading aloud to a friend on a crisp fall evening, or for telling around a campfire when the sky is full of stars, or for reading by yourself in an isolated old house as the wind rises and the rain blows against the roof and a shutter bangs downstairs.... Well, maybe not.