School Of Fear

Around Halloween each year I like to select a “spooky” book to read for our homeschool book club. This October we read School of Fear book 1. And it was hit! Well, with most of the kids.

School of fear is a series of three books that follow five kids on their adventure to over come the fears they have. One is afraid of death, one small spaces, one water, one germs and lastly… bugs.

It was an interesting concept because everybody is afraid of something and it is interesting because the fears have taken over their lives so completely that they can live in normal society. The amount of special accommodations that they parents make is mind blowing to me! For instance, allowing your son to call everybody in the family once an hour to make sure they have not died. While also not driving as a whole family in one car just in case you are on an accident. Or having your friends tent their house before you visit! I just think of the cost associated with that and cringe.

The one complaint from my book clubbers is that the story took a while to get going. I personally did not think that was the case because the back stories for the kids were important to see the characters try and overcome their fears. I thought the writer, Gitty Daneshvari, did a great job building interest in the success for each of the kids. I was rooting for each and every one of them to overcome their fear!

Every one of the kids LOVED the fears listed at the beginning of each chapter. It did make a fun discussion about what the silliest fear was! As well try to pronounce the name correctly… I failed majorly at this part but the kids did pretty well! We all agreed that the fear of baldness was pretty funny.

Of course, when the kids all arrive at the school, it is occupied by the funniest of characters! The headmistress is such a flamboyant character and I love to picture her walking the halls of the mansion.  Oh, don’t get me started in the mansion! It is filled with doors of all shapes and sizes that lead to some crazy rooms, like the library of smells.

There were some great morals to the story; not everything is as it seems, it’s okay to put yourself in an uncomfortable situation because it can help you grow and that friends come in from all different place and JUST who you think are cool.

I really enjoyed the first book in this series and I plan to read two other books as well.