old short story book from scholastic book fair that the internet swears does not exist
so back in the day when scholastic book fairs were still a big thing (probably around 2010-2013ish) i remember looking through the catalog to pick out books for my mom to purchase. this was definitely in the height of the “scary stories to tell in the dark” craze but my mom thought that cover looked too scary and wouldn’t buy those for me. so before anyone suggests “scary stories to tell in the dark” it’s definitely NOT that book.
this other one was another short story collection of scary stories for kids. but the cover was a lot more unassuming, more cartoonish, definitely looked like it would be less scary but these stories wound up being really freaky.
i only remember four of the short stories. one was called “webs” about a boy and his family who move to a new house that’s overrun with spiders and his whole family is essentially eaten except for him because he escapes at the end and hitchhikes to safety. another was called “the tea house” which was about two best friends who wanted to explore a haunted tea house at night and see if the legend of the dead wife haunting it was real. the third one was called “the doll house” and this one i can’t totally remember besides a little girl gets a creepy old dollhouse and i think the dolls were making her sick and trying to steal her life but don’t quote me on that. and the last one i remember was maybe the freakiest of all. it was called “many many many” and it was about a group of friends that wanted to explore a burned down apartment building and play with a ouija board in it. one of the kids really doesn’t want to but they start using the board anyways and it begins spelling “many” over and over again because i think it has some sort of satanic meaning. they wind up seeing the ghosts of the people who died in the fire and they all run out but then they notice the friend who didn’t want to partake is missing so they go back in and he’s super dead. that one really gave me the creeps.
basically the stories scared me too bad back then so my mom gave the book away and i’ve never been able to find any trace of it existing on the internet. i’ve done countless searches and nothing ever comes up that even remotely resembles the book i’m thinking of.
i was wondering if anybody could point me in the right direction or has any sort of recollection of this book. maybe it isn’t lost media and i’m stupid or maybe this is a candle cove moment 😭😰😊 any help would be mighty appreciated!
Posted Jul 23, 2026, 5:11 AM UTC