Some Christians get really up tight about Halloween. I don’t understand this.

This morning, I discovered that San Antonio spends the most money on Halloween in America (tied with Austin and Charlotte, NC).

Probably that’s because the day of the dead is very big around here.

My family loves Halloween. Not harvest. Not some Christianized version of trick or treat. We love Halloween itself. My kids love to dress up. They love wonderful spooky stories with ghosts and skeletons and zombies and scarecrows.

My four-year-old son just discovered the Goosebumps videos. Should I feel bad that he and my daughter love them? I don’t. They are Grimm’s fairy tales for the 21st century. Do they have monsters? Sure. Just like Rapunzel has the monstrous witch. Just like Hansel and Gretel has the monstrous step-mother and the monstrous witch. Just like the Ginger Bread Man runs runs as fast as he can but always gets eaten by the monstrous fox.

My son loves the movies because they make him feel brave. (He doesn’t get nightmares, but we are careful to watch for that sort of thing.)

Why do my kids love these movies? Why does my son check out Halloween books every time we go to the library? Why does he ask me to tell the story of the zombie, the skeleton, and the scarecrow who live in the church graveyard?

All stories of death and pain–even the ones that end badly–contain the hope of redemption. They are tales of warning about how the world could be. Sometimes they are tales that reassure us we are not alone in our fears and sufferings.

Don’t get me wrong. Halloween. Scary movies. Zombies and gore and vampires in the night are not for everyone. For some, people fear leads to more fear.

For others, books and stories of fear help us purge the darkness that is inside us. Or else, they just give us permission to tell stories with the most wonderful monsters and the most imaginative, magical conflicts.

Over the past year, we have probably read every Halloween book in existence. Here are some of our all time favorites in no particular order.

1. The Grandmas Trick-or-Treat is perfect for my generation with our competitive grandparent “problem.” Kids who spend lots of time with both sets of grandmothers will love this.
2. How Spider Saved Halloween was my favorite as a kid. My kids like it too.
3. The Hallo-wiener this book is just hilarious. A wiener dog’s mother gives him a lame costume, but he still manages to save the day from the bully trick-or-treaters.
4. One Halloween Night is one that my kids adore. My son has checked this book out from the library time after time after time. It is wonderfully magical, with a good moral against bullies and tricksters.
5. Six Creepy Sheep is one of the funnest rhyming books. (Funnest?)
6. Skeleton Hiccups is about as hilarious as it sounds.
7. The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything is practically a classic. Like many of these other books, it teaches kids to be brave. But it also gives them permission to allow themselves to get a little spooked sometimes!
8. Bats at the Beach isn’t really a Halloween book per se, but the illustrations are so wonderful. And if you’re nervous about Halloween, books about bats and spiders and other creepy crawlies can be a good way to sidestep the issue.
9. Bats! Creatures of the Night is the best bat book I’ve read. Believe me, I’ve read a lot of them. This one is not too long, and it has both good illustrations and fascinating details.
10. The Witch’s Child is probably my favorite Halloween fairy tale. An evil witch. A lifeless scarecrow doll. A field full of children who have been turned into thorn bushes. And a little girl who discovers the life-giving power of love. OK, that makes it sound cheesy, but it’s cool.

Z is for Zombie and The House of Boo both get honorable mentions as two of my favorite children’s Halloween books. The kids like these as well, but they will be on the edge of too scary for some.

Happy Halloween!