The Ghosts Who Danced: and other spooky stories

by Saviour Pirotta, Saviour Pirotta

Ten deliciously spooky ghost stories from all over the world are perfectly matched by Paul Hess's atmospheric and witty illustrations. The stories included The Ghost Ship (USA); Dogs to the Rescue (Russia); I'll Be Back (Lithuania); The Ghosts Who Danced (Ireland); The Haunted Farmhouse (England); Them Bananas (East Africa); Welcome to the Red Palace Inn (China); The Mystery Guest (Brazil); The Ghost and his Uncle (India); Atchoo! (Korea).

Genres: Death

64 pages, Hardcover

First published September 3, 2015

About the author

Saviour Pirotta is the award-winning author of over one hundred fiction and nonfiction books for children. His works have been translated into 28 languages. Originally from Malta, he now lives in England.

Reviews

[Barbara]

Although there isn't anything wrong with the ten very short stories presented in this book, they aren't all that scary. While many of them feature ghosts in the form of dogs, a grandfather who wants his books back, or a scholar who helps others, the lessons seem to overshadow the spooky element. It might be that a young audience would be entertained by each of these because of their mysterious qualities, but I doubt that there would be much goose flesh on listeners' arms. The fact that the stories originated in various parts of the world, including Russia, Lithuania, China, and India may enhance this collection's charms. The watercolor paint and colored pencil illustrations in this publication from the United Kingdom had more appeal for me than the stories themselves.

[Marie Hayes]

We bought this book for Halloween this year. The well-written stories are perfectly judged for my 7 year old. Spooky but not too scary and they are a brilliant introduction to cultures from around the world.

[Rosa Cline]

These stories from around the world were really neat to read. At the end of the book it gives small paragraph telling about the 'truth' about the story. where it came from the folklore behind it etc. This was an interesting collection. I did tag it as Halloween only simply because it is nice to read during that time of year but you , of course, don't have to read it at Halloween to enjoy it.

[Jen]

I won this book in a contest on Goodreads. My son has recently gotten in to ghost stories and paranormal stuff, so we were excited to read it. But it fell a little short of expectations. The writing was a bit flat. The stories were kind of long for a children's book and rather short for a book for older readers. Most if not all of the stories were more about the living than the ghosts, with quite a lot of those being more backstory than actual story. Still, it was fun to read about different interpretations of ghosts from different countries. Definitely worth a read, but it could have been a lot better.

[Mikey]

I don't get any of the stories.

[Edward Sullivan]

Not particularly scary ghost stories from around the world.