Books published by publisher Steven E. Burt

Grand Prize winner, 2019 New York Book Festival From Bram Stoker Award-winning author Steve Burt comes a new novel for adults and teens. Could things get any weirder in Wells, Maine? Working at Annie's Book Stop, Keegan has read plenty of mysteries. But she's never been part of one. Until now. It starts when someone - or some thing - burglarizes a different local bookstore, Toil & Trouble, stealing an obscure book of little interest, except possibly to a collector. It gets stranger when someone appearing to be a hunchbacked nun comes to Annie's Book Stop to order a reprint of the same book and two books on local graveyards! But before they can be picked up, a robed and hooded figure breaks into Annie's after hours and rifles through the special-orders shelf. Is there more to this book than meets the eye? More questions come up, but the most important one is: Can Keegan survive long enough to unravel the big secrets of her small town?

From 4-time Mom's Choice Award winner Steve Burt and veteran middle-school teacher Jolyn Joslin comes this exciting book for kids that's also a fabulous tool for parents, grandparents, and teachers: 13 ghost stories and weird tales to help kids read, learn, and write their own stuff. These are the thought-provoking stories young readers love. A boy approaches an old woman tending a grave garden. On a dare a brother and sister enter a bone yard on Halloween to free a sea captain's earthbound spirit. A pup returns to life after 50 years in a tomb. Four school kids battle a giant worm that crosses from its tunnel into theirs. Two girls discover a puppet shop run by a puppet. A drowned corpse pursues six summer campers who have taken the war canoe out for a late-night ride. Each story has discussion questions followed by a writing prompt to help turn readers into writers. Works well with adult supervision or with self-directed students. And the stories are perfect for teachers to use as 15-minute activities at the end of the day.

First in the FreeKs series (FreeK Show is second, FreeK Week is third). An adventure that's out of this world. And in it. Free Camp, which somehow became known as FreeK Camp, is for special kids. But just how special most people will never know. Two vans are on their way to the camp in rural Maine, the teen passengers just starting to get acquainted. One van makes it. The other mysteriously disappears. Now each group of kids must bond together to discover and use their paranormal and psychic powers. The lives of one group literally depend on it. Part mystery thriller, part detective story, part sci-fi, FreeK Camp is all hold-your-breath-I-didn't-see-that-coming adventure.

Winner of the 2015 Florida Book Festival Grand Prize, the New England Book Festival Award, and the Mom's Choice gold. FreeK Week is number three in the FreeKs series featuring psychic teen detectives. Spring break in Florida is a blast - for the FreeKs it's a killer Five of the psychic teens are going to Florida over spring break. They can stay with fellow FreeK Caroline and their mentors Bando, Rose, and Twait. But somebody wants them to stay home and will use fire, rattlesnakes, and more to keep them away. As they prepare to leave New England, Charlie has one of his dreams - a murder and a kidnapping - only it's happening in real time in the Sunshine State. The dead man is a former circus midget who worked with Twait, Bando, and Rose in their sideshow days. And that's just the first murder. The trail will take the FreeKs from Cassadaga (psychic medium capital of the world) to Gibsonton (Freaktown USA, America's Weirdest Town) - with side trips to The Villages (Florida's Friendliest Hometown, unless somebody's out to kill you) and Ocala (Horse Capital of the World) - and finally to the capital, Tallahassee. What the teens will remember about FreeK Week won't be their visit to Daytona Beach or the airboat ride in the gator swamps - it'll be sharing their gifts, working together, and fighting to survive. The series has now won 24 international awards, including four Mom's Choice golds, the Moonbeam Award (silver), and a host of Book Festival awards.

When This Camp's In Session, It's Not Just Fun & Games. Sometimes, It's Murder. The FreeKs are back so, naturally, trouble's not far behind. Several of the kids have returned a year older and more adept with their paranormal skills. There's also a hot new guy, Damon. When he sees Atlanta, with her streaked hair and body piercings, you don't have to be psychic to feel the electricity. Just as the group gathers, a body is discovered under bizarre circumstances. It looks like suicide, but when the ghosts from last year show up with a strange ethereal companion, the FreeKs and their adult mentors have to conclude it's a murder. And they're being drawn into it. It's out of the frying pan into the fire when the murderer targets two at FreeK Camp for abduction and murder. But why these two? As the victims are taken, new talents and an assist from an unexpected ally all come into play. But the sun is coming up and time is running out.

This is a revised edition (2015) of the 2003 collection of 15 weird tales that was named one of five Bram Stoker Award finalists in the Young Readers category. This version costs less because it doesn't have the Jessica Hagerman pen-and-ink cover and illustrations, just the stories. The original book was eventually a runner-up to winner Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Even Odder is number two in the four-book Stories to Chill the Heart series by Steve Burt, whose FreeKs psychic teen detectives series recently won the Florida Book Festival grand prize and four Mom's Choice Awards.

From 4-time Mom's Choice Award winner Steve Burt and veteran middle-school teacher Jolyn Joslin comes this collection of 13 deliciously creepy tales for 8 to 15 year-olds. Discussion questions after each story for parents, grandparents, and teachers who want to check young readers' comprehension. Ideal for campfire reading or as a filler at the end of the school day. (The same stories and questions can be found in a slightly different version that has a different cover.)

You want strange? You got it. Wicked Strange, as they say in New England. Imagine looking out your window in Nashua, New Hampshire and seeing an other-worldly hearse cruising up and down the street in search of a soul. Heard about Plantation 13, the rural Maine backwater, where the males birth the babies through their eye sockets? Hey, don't pet that infected dog! It's been in that concrete wall over three decades. And what's up with those giant moths trapped in the tower of the Pemaquid Point Lighthouse? Be sure to cross the road when you go past the old witchy woman's place along the White River in Bethel, Vermont or you may run into the spirit-stealers. Spend a day with Ruger, the new caretaker apprentice at the old felons' bone yard in Augusta, Maine. You say you need your fix of New England weirdness? Well, you're guaranteed to find it here under the covers--the front and back covers--of Bram Stoker Award winner Steve Burt's latest collection: Wicked Strange. Excerpted from Bram Stoker Award-winning author Steve Burt's four Stories to Chill the Heart collections: Odd Lot, Even Odder, Oddest Yet, and Wicked Odd.

2015 New England Book Festival Award. Steve Burt's three Devaney & Hoag Vermont ghost-buster mystery stories, previously published in three different books, are collected here in one large-print volume. "The Witness Tree," "The French Acre," and "The Chambers Crypt" are all set in Norwich, Vermont. Hoag is a Valley News reporter who is frequently called upon to investigate unusual (paranormal) stories; Devaney is his retired-teacher father-in-law who tags along to snap pictures. Dr. Burt is the author of many books with New England settings, including the Bram Stoker Award-winning Stories to Chill the Heart series (Odd Lot, Even Odder, Oddest Yet, and Wicked Odd), the FreeKs paranormal teen detectives series (FreeK Camp, FreeK Show, and FreeK Week, winner of the Florida Book Festival Grand Prize and the New England Book Festival Award). His inspirational New England holiday collection, A Christmas Dozen, was a national bestseller.