Welcome to My 31 Days Of Thrills And Chills 2026! I’m so excited to do it again. I’ll be sharing reviews and lots of extra spooky stuff every day leading up to Halloween. I hope you’ll join me!
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I’m sharing all kinds of books, movies, and other spooky stuff for every day in October. Gots to get those scares on for the 31st!
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A Bite Above The Rest
By Christine Virnig
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Genre: Fantasy / Halloween / Middle Grade
MY REVIEW
There be monster’s in Samhain, Wisconsin. Big Ones. Little ones. Some with wings and fangs and fins. Not such a surprise for a town that keeps their decorations up year round. They even wear their costumes every day. But wait…… I mentioned monsters so…. are they really costumes?
Caleb was not happy about moving to Samhain. The town was weird. The residents were even weirder. His refusal to buy into the Halloween obsession doesn’t earn him any points. He does find a friend in Tai and that’s going to be important as he discovers the secrets of his new town.
Caleb and Tai were such a delight. I loved every bit of their investigations into the strange goings on. Their texts back and forth and the quirky illustrations just added to this super fun book.
In my younger years I would have devoured A Bite Above The Rest. As an adult, I did eat it up, smiling and laughing all the way.
5 STARS
Thanks so much to Simon & Schuster and Author Christine Virnig for a complimentary copy. My review is voluntarily given.
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Synopsis
A boy moves to a Halloween-themed town only to realize there may be more to the tourist trap than meets the eye in this fast-paced romp of a middle grade novel perfect for fans of The Last Kids on Earth and Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library !
When Caleb’s mom decides they are moving to her childhood home in Wisconsin, Caleb is not thrilled. Moving schools, states, and time zones would be bad enough, but Mom’s hometown is Samhain, a small and ridiculously kitschy place where every day is Halloween.
Caleb is not a fan of Halloween when it only happens once a year, so Halloween-obsessed Samhain is really not the place for him. How is he supposed to cope with kids wearing costumes to school every single day ? And how about the fact that the mayor is so committed to the bit that City Hall is only open from sundown to sunup to accommodate his so-called vampirism? Sure enough, Caleb becomes an outcast at school for refusing to play along with the spooky tradition like the other sixth graders. Luckily, he manages to find a friend in fellow misfit Tai, and just in time, because things are getting weird in Samhain…or make that weird er .
But there’s no way the mayor is an actual vampire, and their teacher absolutely cannot really be a werewolf—right? Caleb discovers Samhain is so much stranger than he ever could have imagined. As one of the only people who realizes what’s happening, can he save a town that doesn’t want saving?
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