SCRITCH! SCRATCH!

In this gentle creepfest, three kids take shelter as they attempt to escape a witch…or are they just imagining her?

“Scritch! Scratch! / What was that? / The witch! / She’s in the pumpkin patch.” Three pale-skinned youngsters, one of whom supplies narration, run inside their house, where there are no adults in sight and the frights continue, because there’s that noise again: “Scritch! Scratch!” On goes the torment—or is it imaginary? At one point, the witch casts “a spell that turns our shoes to glue, / a spell that makes it hard to move.” After much agonizing and hiding, the kids finally believe they are safe: They look outside and spot the witch “riding on her brambly broom, / she’s soaring high across the moon.” But wait: Now what’s scritch-scratching outside the door? This story is beautifully conceived and executed, with enticing, unpredictable rhymes throughout. Cupova’s ink-and-watercolor art relies on black-and-white chiaroscuro to terrific dramatic effect; the book’s only color comes in the form of tomato-red bursts reserved for things like the moon, spiders’ legs, and the eyes of a cat that was—well, what do you know?—the cause of the scritch-scratching the whole time. (Probably.)

Halloween perfection for kids who want a good scare…and the relief that comes from knowing that everything is all right.