Books with author Vivian Vande Velde

Falsely accused of witchcraft, 15-year-old Alys is staked out on a hillside and left as sacrificial bait for a hungry dragon. It's cold. And dark. And raining. And Alys is thoroughly alone. Even when she breaks free of her bindings, there's nowhere for her to go. If she tries to return to her village, the people of St. Toby's will simply stake her out again.Alys hears wolves howling in the distance. Then she sees the shadow of the dragon coursing across the moon. The question is...does the dragon see Alys?

Grace Pizzelli is the average one, nothing like her brilliant older sister, Emily, who works for Rasmussem, creators of the world’s best virtual reality games. The games aren’t real, though—or at least they weren’t. Now Emily has hidden herself inside a pink and sparkly game meant for little girls. No one knows why, or how to convince her to come back out, and the technology can’t keep her safe for much longer. Grace may consider herself average, but she’s the only one who can save Emily. So Grace enters the game, hoping to talk her sister out of virtual suicide before time runs out. Otherwise Emily will die—for real.

Fifteen-year-old Raquel Falcone is, as one of her classmates puts it, the kind of kid who has a tendency to be invisible. That is until the night she's hit by a car and killed while walking home from the movies. In brief, moving chapters, we hear about Raquel from her classmates, her best friend, her family--and the woman who was driving the car that struck her. The loss of this seemingly invisible girl deeply affects her entire community, proving just how interconnected and similar we all really are.

Vivian Vande Velde's spellbinding short stories are filled with magic and mayhem. Witness the boy who breaks his dance date because he's too cheap to spend money on her. He learns about spells the hard way in Curses, Inc. What happens when a woman brings her son back from the dead in "The Witch's Son"? Many folks go to Granny Orilla for remedies. Does a cure or a curse await in "Cypress Swamp Granny"? Beware: These haunting stories will put you under their spell.

When Ted’s five-year-old sister, Vicki, invents an imaginary friend, no one is too concerned . . . except that Vicki’s friend has the never-popular name of Marella, and unlike most imaginary friends, Marella can move things. Ted might think Marella is a ghost, but why would a ghost haunt Vicki, of all people? And why would she suddenly move into a house Ted’s family has lived in for ages? And why is Marella terrified of another ghost, a dark figure who seems to be hunting Ted? Hilarious, haunting, and unexpectedly moving, There’s a Dead Person Following My Sister Around is Vivian Vande Velde at her frightening best.

A boy is trapped in a possessed car that has stalled in the path of an oncoming train. A girl is dragged into a crypt during a field trip to an eighteenth-century cemetery. A group of friends meet their fate after an unsettling visit with a backwoods psychic. And that's just the beginning. Celebrated author Vivian Vande Velde is at her spine-tingling best in this collection of thirteen scary stories, all of which take place on Halloween night. With tales that range from the disturbing to the downright gruesome, this is one collection that teens will want to read with the lights on . . . and the doors locked.

Life has suddenly become very difficult for Selwyn Roweson: First Anora broke his heart and decided to marry Farold, then Farold beat him up in front of the entire village, and finally he was accused of murder when Farold was found with a knife--Selwyn’s knife--hilt-deep in his back. Which might not be so bad, except as punishment Selwyn is sealed in the village burial cave with Farold’s moldering corpse, there to await starvation--or worse. Worse comes along quickly in the form of a witch with a fast right hook and the ability to raise Farold from the dead. Selwyn thought he disliked Farold when he was alive, but that was nothing compared to having to work by the dead man’s side as they search for the real killer.