Horror House

The plot of Horror House revolves around you helping your YouTube creator cousin Kanisha with her “Haunts and Homes” episode. Immediately, Kanisha disappears towards the basement. You see blood red letters appear in the wooden door threatening that, by midnight, you and Kanisha will be possessed by the haunts in this house. You must find Kanisha and escape the house before midnight.

Whether you are able to find one or more of the 10 ways to survive, turn into a piece of artwork, get absorbed into the floorboards, or get permanently stuck in a chair is up to you to discover. There is a lot of fun in reading this story and discovering the variety of endings and plot twists. The writing is good and keeps the plots interesting. The story's conclusions are satisfying whether the reader is attempting to survive, or not. One of the more surprising endings is when it turns out that both you and Kanisha are part of the history of this house and Kanisha survives and watches (with satisfaction) as you get absorbed into the house floorboards.
While this reviewer is a strong supporter of ‘choose your own’ story books, they are difficult to review as they are not narratives that are read in front cover to back cover order. That said, Horror House was a really fun book from Jeff Szpirglas. Horror House is one of six books in this ‘Countdown to Danger’ series according to the Scholastic Canada website. The only thing I would have preferred, when thinking about the audience for this novel, is there being the occasional illustration to add to the feeling of adventure (or misadventure). However, even without added illustrations, Horror House was excellent and will add variety to a typical reading list as well as being a great addition to a classroom or school library.