Prom Nights from Hell

The title of this book grabbed me from the moment I saw it on the reading list. I think they couldn’t have picked a better title to grab teens, especially teen girls who may be dreading their prom or have no interest in going. I think this book would appeal primarily to teen girls. I can’t imagine that many teen boys would have heard of or really enjoyed writers like Meg Cabot or Kim Harrison. I thought that it was interesting to see Meg Cabot step out of her comfort zone and write a short scary story. The other authors seem to be well-known horror/thriller/fantasy writers.

This book is a nice transition book for the teens who may feel like they are too old to read series like Goosebumps and Fear Street books, but are looking for that quick fix of kind of creepy and want to look like they are reading a more adult like book. I like that the stories were short and easily digestible. A teen could read them all in one sitting or pick up the book on the way to school or before bed and not have to feel like it was a heavy commitment. Some of the stories were better than others. I felt like Madison Avery and the Grim Reaper left the story too open, even for a short story, and there was really no closure for Madison. It was the longest of the group, so I would have expected more from it. The Corsage on the other hand was great. The story was a little predictable and you knew that things were going to go horribly wrong for Frankie. I was a little shocked and delighted that there was no happy ending for Frankie and Will. I thought that with most wish stories that Frankie would be able to set things right.

Again, as with every book, I would want to see what the teen was interested in. But I think what is nice about this book is that it is an anthology and there may be some stories that the teens really like and some that they like less. It is not like a typical novel where they have invested the time with only one or two characters they don’t like and a plot that they hate. That being said, I wouldn’t suggest this to a teen that would never read something in this genre and hate it just because the stories are short and varied.