On the Day I Died:Stories from the Grave by Candace Fleming, 199 pp, RL MIDDLE GRADE

On the Day I Died: Stories from the Grave is the newest book from the multitalented (and multi-awardwinning) Candace Fleming with cool over art by Jeremy Holmes . I am so excited by this book and hope that it heralds more to come. I loved a good ghost story when I was a kid, which was also a time when things of a scary and gruesome nature were not commonplace in the media unlike today. The stories I remember weren't gory and nothing my parents (who would not let me see The Amityville Horror when I was ten but did allow me to see Poltergeist three years later, much to my delight) would object to. These days, with so many violently graphic movies and video games on the market I think it's a true challenge to write a ghost story for young readers that is not explicit yet satisfying, which is exactly what Fleming does with On the Day I Died: Stories from the Grave . I also think that most kids have a healthy interest in the supernatural, whether it exists or not,