It's the day before Halloween, and goblins, princesses, and Jedi have taken over the school. Every classroom is out of control as fifth-grade monsters pretend to eat a group of younger students and princesses hide in the bathroom to compare costumes. The teachers are fighting to maintain control, but the pre-Halloween celebrations aren't the worst of it. On Halloween Day, there is the annual student parade where students dress up, and ghosts, ghouls, fairies, and pirates take over the school completely. It's mayhem across the school this year, and the teachers are in for the biggest trick-or-treat of their careers.
Halloween is the one day of the entire school year that teachers dread most, and this year, the students have started celebrating a day early. Cupcake icing is smeared all over a third-grade classroom, and everyone is preparing for the annual Halloween Day parade. With princesses running a tiara trade ring in the girls' bathroom and a laser sword battle among fourth-grade space rangers, the teachers are quickly losing control of the school to Halloween spirit.
When a group of fifth-grade monsters tie up two first-graders and prepare to eat them, the teachers are ready to call it quits, but the principal insists on perfect teacher attendance on October 31. It looks like this year's Halloween will be more trick than treat.
It's up to the students and their parents to show the teachers a new kind of Halloween and give them a holiday treat they'll never forget.
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Steven L. Layne serves as director of the Master of Education in Literacy program at Judson University in Elgin, Illinois, where he is also an associate professor of education and literature. Dr. Layne's collection of Pelican books includes several titles in the signature Night Before Christmas Series, including Preacher's Night Before Christmas, The Teachers' Night Before Christmas, and The Principal's Night Before Christmas. He is also the author of the gift books Verses for Dad's Heart and Verses for Mom's Heart and two young-adult thrillers, This Side of Paradise and Mergers. This is Layne's second picture book collaboration with illustrator Ard Hoyt, the first being the widely successful Love the Baby. Layne lives with his wife and their four children in Illinois.
Born in Temple, Texas, Ard Hoyt is the illustrator of nine picture books, including the New York Times bestseller I'm a Manatee, by John Lithgow, and Steven Layne's Love the Baby. Hoyt lives in Arkansas with his wife and five daughters.