The Halloween Tree

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Originally published: New York : Knopf, 1972.
A group of children and a "spirit" go back through time to discover the beginnings of Halloween.

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A Halloween Carol submitted by jaegerla on October 21, 2009, 10:32am Other holidays have a multitude of books written in honor of them, but where is the main text for Halloween? Sure, there are plenty of scary, eerie, and unsettling books published to get you in the mood for the holiday, but what can stand on it's own as exemplary of Halloween itself? Something that can be reread annually, such as A Christmas Carol is to Christmas. The Halloween Tree is the answer to this question.

A short read, this book poetically jumps through the origins of the celebration throughout time and other cultures. The imagery is pure Halloween, with jackolanterns, an abandoned house, gargoyles, mummies, witches, cemetaries, and what might be a ghost. Bradbury seems to effortlessly create a wild, fun, fantastic world for the reader as soon as the story begins in a small Indiana town.

There was an animated movie based on the novel that has not yet been released on DVD, but the movie is a classic as well.