I watched this video on lost Goosebumps books and then accidentally fell down a thought spiral of all the weird horror I was obsessed with in elementary school.
It reminded me of this odd book I read in early elementary school called Back to School about a lunch lady who puts weird stuff in the food and then the kids start getting massive lumps in their skin and it turns out there are bugs inside them and the lunch lady is a bug and I think all the students turn into bugs at the end.
I also LOVED those Haunted Canada and Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series. Also, this one called Ghosts: Usborne's True Stories (or something) and the story about the Bell Witch in it. I lived with my grandma when I read & owned those books and I have no clue how I managed to convince her to buy them for me because she thought they were demonic and would turn me evil.
I remember there was this one specific story in the Haunted Canada series called Miss Kirkpatrick's Secret, and it honestly altered my entire brain as a kid. Same with this one story that I forget the name of about someone laying in a clearing playing this game they made up where the couldn't move from that spot until they saw something break the clearness of the sky—an airplane, a cloud, a bird. The whole thing is about this game and the panic they feel one day when the game goes on for what seems like an eternity until they finally leave and they get lost on the way home.
I was as much of a horror enthusiast and collector then as I am now. I had BOTH cover editions of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark because they had different illustrations in them, plus like 90% of the Goosebumps books and all of Haunted Canada. Even the ones with completely different writers and titles. I kind of want to start collecting them again. I'm sad I gave them away when I moved as a kid.
In late elementary school, I got into young teen books and I grew obsessed with this author called Katie Alender. From what I remember, the books were honestly not that good, but I DEVOURED them. I guess I've always sort of consumed horror like there's not enough to go around.
And then all this reminded me of how UNHINGED I was about Creepypasta in 9th grade and how truly scared I was (still am tbh) of Smile Dog. I'm just thinking about how I used to watch Lavender Towne's and Jordan Persegati's art videos based on the stories.
Anyway, now I DESPERATELY need to reread absolutely all of these books as soon as I can.
