SOLVED. Scholastic Book Fair Title of Vampire Short Stories. [s]

[Courtney]

Hello,

I'm looking for a collection of vampire short stories purchased from a Scholastic Book Fair sometime between 1995-2002 (most likely before 2000).

I can't recall the title or author(s) but do remember the cover. It was a blue background with a broken down mansion and a stereotypical creepy vampire in the foreground (I think the title was in raised print). The book was somewhere between 100-150 pages and I think contained only 10 stories (might have been more).

As for the stories themselves, the very first one was about a group of girls who spend the night in the creepy mansion in their town. Rumor has it that it's inhabited by a vampire. The girls get scared and leave but one girl gets kidnapped by the vampire and turned. She goes back for her best friend (who left her there with the vampire). Can't remember how this one ends.

Another story was about a hypochondriac girl who is invited to a costume party and during a power outage is bitten by what she thinks is a vampire (I remember she made her own costume and it was Marie Antoinette). Convinced she's becoming a vampire, she develops all the symptoms and attempts to fly out her bedroom window to go to her "master". She fails and breaks her leg (or arm?) and as her parents are driving her home from the hospital, she looks out the window, sees the moon, and howls all while canine-like hairs are sprouting out of her arms. It ends there with the the understanding that she's been bitten by a werewolf, not a vampire. I think that may have been the only non-vampire story.

The last story in the book was about a family on a road trip. It's late and the family is hungry. One son convinces his dad to not worry about making good time and to pull off at the first exit for dinner. He does and it's an exit not listed on their map. The restaurant they go to is for vampires and they serve blood. When the vampires realize that they have humans in their midst, one of them goes crazy and tries to attack the family. The others stop him, saying that they don't feed like this anymore, and the family leaves. As the family gets back on the highway, they hear a loud thud on the roof of their car. The son, who got his dad to stop in the first place, says something along the lines of "I think we should just keep driving all night, Dad". And that's the end of the story.

There are more stories but I can't remember any of them.

I contacted Scholastic a couple of years ago about the book but they couldn't help since it had been more than ten years since I purchased the book. I've had no luck looking on Google, Amazon, or other bookish sites. This was one of my favorite childhood books and I'd love to find it.

If anyone knows this book or can help me find it, I'd really appreciate it.

Thank you so much!

[Laina]

Oh, hmm.

Well, this isn't it but I'll list it anyways just in case: Real Vampires.

All Hallows' Eve: 13 Stories

Vampires

Teeth: Vampire Tales

Bites: Scary Stories to Sink Your Teeth Into

Thirteen Tales of Horror

Worth a shot!

[Courtney]

Unfortunately, none of these is the book I'm looking for.

Although- you did add a couple titles to my TBR list.

Thanks!

[Laina]

Bummer, I wish one of them had been it!

If it encourages you, it took me two of these groups and just under SIX YEARS to find my most persistent one and I totally did. It can totally be done!

Maybe it would be worth searching in either google books or even your local library's catalogue system using the keywords "scholastic vampire short stories" and see what comes up?

[Courtney]

I'll give that a shot- I haven't tried my library yet. Their shelves have never had much in the way of vampiric lore but who knows?

Worse case scenario, I can wait years like you did. This book is worth that.

Nostalgia, you know?

[Laina]

If your library is in a system of other libraries, the online website might have listings for, like, everywhere. In mine, publisher is listed on the page so it comes up in searches. Worth a shot!

Hopefully someone knows it first, though! You never know who has obscure knowledge in their head XD And yes, I totally do!

[Kris]

Courtney, what was the tone - really creepy/scary (like R.L. Stine), campy/bit funny at times, etc.?

Cover art - cartoony, realistic, etc.?

[Courtney]

The tone was definitely R.L. Stine creepy.

As for the cover art, it was definitely a cartoon intended to be scary (though it was actually corny).

[Kris]

Here are some lists of R.L. Stine books:

https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/7...
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/7...

[Angela]

Fate Worse Than Death and More Fright with a Bite by Allen B. Ury?

You can search inside it on Google Books: https://books.google.com/books/about/A_Fate_Worse_Than_Death.html?id=SoIqnkGLNE0C

By searching "party," I was able to find some lines that reminded me of the hypochondriac character who gets bitten at the Halloween party.

Page 95: "Suddenly the life of the party, Amanda loved all the attention she was getting. Gone were her usual concerns about airborne germs, contaminated food, and unsanitized serving dishes."

Page: 105: "'West High who'd crashed the Lieberman's party. That's why he didn't tell you his name.'
'So, you see, Amanda, this whole vampire thing was all in your head,' her father concluded."

[Courtney]

Holy cow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You found it!!!!!

Thank you so much! You're awesome!!

I can't wait to get it and read it with my kids!

But- when you say you searched "party" I assume that was on Google Books, after you'd found the book, right? If so, how did you find the book? I've tried for so long and had no luck; any tips for in the future?

Again, thanks a million!

[Angela]

Glad to help! I work in a library, so I like to do this during slow times on the desk to keep my research skills fresh. :)

To find this book, I used www.worldcat.org. Worldcat is a great source because it lets you plug in a few keywords related to your book, and then you can narrow down your search by publication year, language, fiction vs. nonfiction, juvenile vs. non-juvenile, etc.

For this search, I did an advanced search using "vampires" and "short stories" as keywords. I set the year range to 1980 - 2000, the Audience to Juvenile, the Content to Fiction, the Format to Book, and the Language to English. WorldCat doesn't always have a lot of detail on each book, so I just went down the list of results and plugged them into Goodreads one at a time. "A Fate Worse Than Death and More Fright with a Bite" came up with a cover that matched your description (but still no details on the content!), so I went to Google Books to see if I could find more information on the stories inside. And there it was! :)

I find a lot of forgotten titles through NoveList Plus, which is a paid database my library subscribes to. It works similarly to Worldcat, only it has even more options to narrow your search down, and more detailed descriptions of the books. If you're interested in doing more research on your own, it might be worth seeing if your local library offers something similar. :)