It contains the following stories:
- "Pumpkin Juice" - Two boys discover a recipe for a meal that turns them into hungry beasts.
- "Attack of the Tattoo" - Jeannie finds a stick-on tattoo in her Halloween bag, but after she applies it, it turns out to be alive.
- "The Wish" - A boy named Max receives the power to make a single wish, which backfires horribly.
- "An Old Story" - Two boys begin to age rapidly into elderly gentlemen by the magic of their Aunt Dahlia, who plans to make them marry her elderly friends once they've grown up enough.
- "The Scarecrow" - Three kids decide to steal the clothes off a scarecrow, but doing so makes them each sick in a way related to the clothing.
- "Awesome Ants" - A boy feeds special pellets to the ants in his ant farm, only for them to grow enormous.
- "Please Don't Feed The Bears" - Sarah's family forces her to go to a cutesy theme park instead of a horror-themed one, only for her to find that the people working there are literal bears that can turn others into more of them.
- "The Goblin's Glare" - Mike Mason creates a papier-mâché goblin, which comes to life.
- "Bats About Bats" - Suzanne and Liz can't stand bats, and decide to try and bring their new classmate Dorrie — whose parents are bat scientists — around to their way of thinking.
- "The Space Suit Snatcher" - A girl receives a strange suit as a gift, which supposedly belonged to an alien.
"An Old Story" and "Awesome Ants" were adapted into episodes of the third season of the 1995 TV series.
The stories contain examples of:
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- Halloween Episode: All of the short stories in this book are set around Halloween, or at least mention it. The only one that doesn't is An Old Story.
Pumpkin Juice
- Here We Go Again!: Charlie and Frank cure themselves only for Charlie's mother to reveal that she drank the juice and is beginning to feel really hungry.
- I Got a Rock: Charlie in his monstrous state goes to a house while trick-or-treating, and is outraged that the person at the front door is handing him a lollipop. So he pushes him aside to break in the house to eat raw eggs.
Attack of the Tattoo
- Animated Tattoo: The short story has Jeannie dealing with an evil one, naturally. And by the end of the story, her entire class has to deal with this.
- Double Take: A boy in Jeannie's class does this when he looks at her snake tattoo. He even does a Dramatic Drop with the ball he was playing with when he sees the tattoo.
- Jaw Drop: Jeannie has this reaction when she goes to school the morning after she got rid of the tattoo and sees that all the students there have tattoos like her own.
- Pajama-Clad Hero: Jeannie disposes of all the snake monsters at night while only wearing her nightgown.
- "Ray of Hope" Ending: The story ends with the entire class having to deal with monsters that were created by tattoos that there applied to their skin. However, Jeannie wonders aloud if the moon is still full, or else they would have to wait around a month.
The Wish
- Adults Are Useless: The parents in "The Wish" do nothing about Eugene's bullying.
- Batter Up!: A clerk at a grocery store grabs a bat when he sees Max and chases him down with it in his hand.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: This short story has Max wishing he was an only child. He becomes the only child on Earth.
- Big Brother Bully: Eugene to Max shown here. He constantly scares him, and steals all of his Halloween candy.
- Cruel Twist Ending: "The Wish" ends when Max wishes he was an only child, due to his abusive older brother. He becomes the only child on Earth.
- Exact Words: This short story features Max not wishing his brother Eugene was gone, but that Max was an only child. He's now literally the ONLY child on Earth.
- Finger Wag: At the end of the story, Max is being carried away by a crowd of adults, and he sees that one of them is the old woman from yesterday who gave him the rock. She had it in her hand, and she was doing this trope as they locked eyes, which was her way of telling him I Warned You.
- Get Out!: A confused Max keeps going to places in his town, but at first the adults he meets take one look at him and scream, yelling at him to go away. Max is quite dumbfounded by this. It's actually because he's the only child left on Earth, and the adults haven't seen a child in so long and think he's a freak.
- Hope Spot: Max is being chased down by a crowd of angry adults, and he finally comes across Ms. Greenway's pet store. After much pleading and begging, she soothingly tells him to calm down, and lets him inside to seemingly protect him. But it turns out she was intentionally making him let his guard down so she could let the crowd in and catch him.
- I Got a Rock: The old woman gives Max an actual rock, but he's so frightened by her appearance and behavior that he just accepts it. It actually turns out to be much more than that.
- Nothing but Skin and Bones: The sinister woman that shows up has this appearance. Max describes it in detail, and he's pretty unnerved by it all.
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: When Max is grabbed by the old woman he's visiting and he demands she let go, to which she replies, "You-Are-Not-Going-Anywhere."
An Old Story
- And Call Him "George": When Tom and Jon's mother finds out that a woman pretended to be the boys' aunt and she left them in her care, she tearfully hugs her sons so tight, she almost choked them to death.
- *Crack!* "Oh, My Back!": Jon says along the lines of this when he walks into the kitchen the first day after eating prune cookies.
- Evil Old Folks: "An Old Story" is about an older woman that's actually a witch who ages up and kidnaps children to sell into marriage to other old people who know they're getting married to children.
- Failed a Spot Check: Tom and Jon's parents realize too late that Dahlia was a total stranger after their father orders them to explain what happened to their mom's aunt. At which point the mom exclaims that she thought Dahlia was the father's aunt.
- Fight for the Last Bite: When Tom at the beginning of the story sees his brother eating the last of the the Oreos, he fights him for it and snatches it away. Even though he's disgusted to find that it's half-eaten and has slobber over it, he still eats it because he was so hungry.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Dahlia's own prunes end up causing her own demise when one of the boys douses her in an emergency stash of prune juice.
- I Can't Hear You: When Tom notices a bald spot appearing on Jon's head, he tries to tell him about it, but Jon replies that he can't hear him and cups his ear to hear better.
- Improbable Antidote: The boys discover by chance that the only thing that reverses the effects of Dahlia's prunes is baby food. Unfortunately, in the TV episode twist, one of the boys overindulged and became a baby, so his brother has to use a little of the magic prune to age him back up to normal.
- My God, What Have I Done?: The boys' parents are horrified with themselves after realizing Dahlia tricked them into thinking she was a relative so she could get into the house.
- Parental Neglect: The parents of Tom and Jon are so busy that they often leave their kids at home alone, which gives Dahlia the chance to come in pretending to be their aunt and enact her plan. Unlike some of the other examples, they do at least show regret once they figure out what happened.
- Rapid Aging: The plot of this story involves two boys being rapidly aged via magical prune juice so they can be sold as bridegrooms to elderly women.
The Scarecrow
- Faint in Shock: Darleen faints when the scarecrow seemingly grabs her.
- Late for School: Darleen and her two friends run into this problem at the beginning of the story. They end up late, and have to be held after school.
- Real After All: Though the whole story was mostly a prank setup by Darleen's two friends to scare her, the Scarecrow smiles on its own at the end, implying it really is alive.
- Scary Scarecrows: This story features a mysterious scarecrow that apparently comes to life.
- Stripping the Scarecrow: "The Scarecrow", a short story about three kids who discover a mysterious scarecrow set up in front of an abandoned house has got articles of clothing they all want. Two of the kids take things off the scarecrow, but strange things start happening to them, leaving the third kid scared something will happen to her while trying to fight back the temptation of taking the scarecrow's gloves for herself. It turns out it was all a prank set up by the other two kids, but that doesn't explain why the scarecrow is suddenly smiling at the end.
- With Friends Like These...: Scott and Melanie faked being ill and pretended that the scarecrow was alive to prank Darleen for calling Halloween boring, essentially gaslighting her for kicks. That said, they do apologize to her at the end for making her faint.
Awesome Ants
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: The ants that are referred to in the title become this. They're the size of humans by the end and put the humans inside their own farm.note
- Sinister Scraping Sound: Dave arrives at his classroom, only to find the whole room empty except him. He then hears a mysterious scratching sound coming from a closet in the back. He opens it to find a gigantic ant.
Please Don't Feed the Bears
- Anger Born of Worry: When Sarah is nearly an hour late to meet her parents for lunch while they're in a theme park, they chide her for making them wait, but it's obviously because of this trope despite her parents saying they were having trouble entertaining her spoiled little sister Katie. Sarah wisely decides not to tell them that the Cuddle Bear employees nearly kidnapped her and wanted her to become a bear.
- Karmic Twist Ending: The short story has this for the main character's bratty little sister. At Cuddle Bear Land, Sarah was nearly turned into a Cuddle Bear when a cast member gives her enchanted graham crackers. When she freaks out on finding some in her bag, she decides to keep it in case a lab can analyze it. After she and her family return home, Katie sneaks into her room and gobbles up the whole bag. Sarah, realizing there's nothing to be done, decides to enjoy her new Cuddle Bear.
The Goblin's Glare
- All Just a Dream: Most of the events in "The Goblin's Glare" turn out to be the Goblin's dream.
- Our Goblins Are Different: This story features a papier-mâché goblin coming to life.
Bats About Bats
- Exact Words: The story features a girl who repeatedly mentions she plans to be a bat scientist just like her parents. As in, she plans to be like her parents who are scientists that are also bats.
The Space Suit Snatcher
- Bilingual Bonus: In-Universe example. Laura signs off every space broadcast with "Peace to all" in different languages, so the aliens can figure it out for themselves. In her final one, she says it in Spanish.
- Passing Notes in Class: Students in Laura's class do this to let each other know what costumes they're wearing for Halloween.
- Sinister Scraping Sound: Laura hears a scratching sound at her bedroom window, and looks to see an ugly alien scratching the window and staring back at her. It was actually her sister in disguise for a prank.
