Night of the Pumpkinheads by Michael J. Rosen

Night of the Pumpkinheads Reviews

• 
  Kathryn

  Did. Not. Like. The story felt so mean-spirited to me. The carved pumpkins are, of course, amazing. But I would only recommend this if you are a huge fan of photos of carved pumpkins. And I don't think it's one I'd recommend for kids.
• 
  Ashley

  The pumpkin carvings were amazing; I didn't care for the story, though.
• 
  Anthony

  All the Pumpkinheads in the patch decide to dress in scary costumes, carve themselves into monsters and leave the patch to scare the children on Halloween, but after all their efforts the children aren't scared one bit, and only want to exchange candies with them. But then something quite ghoulish comes along, and scare the wits out of the children, and amaze the pumpkinheads.
• 
  Karen

  Love the mixed media illustrations in this cute picture book.
• 
  Katherine Austin

  1)Book summary, in your own words (3 pts)
  -Tired of spending Halloween sitting on people's porches and not being able to dress up, a group of Jack-O-Lanterns decide to revolt against their holiday tradition. This year, they want to dress up and actually scare the children. The pumpkins have a grand time determining what to dress up as and getting their costumes together, so much that they grab the attention from the other vegetables who ask if they can join them. The pumpkins laugh in amusement and say that there is no way that kids would be scared of vegetables.Eventually, Halloween approaches and the Jack-O-Lanterns have yet to scare even one kid. Then, they hear a herd of children screaming in terror while running away from the thing kids hate most in the world... vegetables. The pumpkins then learn that they should have let the vegetables participate with them and apologize to them for their exlusion.
  2) Grade level, interest level, lexile (1 pt)
  -Kindergarten-3rd Grade
  3) Appropriate classroom use (subject area) (1 pt)
  -Reading Language Arts
  4) Individual students who might benefit from reading (1 pt)
  -Students who tend to leave other children out of discussion or activities
  -Students that love Halloween
  5) Small group use (literaturecircles) (1 pt)
  - Have students read aloud in pairs and small groups. Have students make predictions on what they think is going to happen before reading.
  6) Whole class use (read aloud) (1 pt)
  -Carpet reading.
  -Before a Halloween Party or on Halloween as fun entertainment.
  7) Related books in genre/subject or content area (1 pt)
  -Jack the Pumpkinhead by Matt Crosser (pumpkins and bullying)
  8) Multimedia connections (audio book, movie) available (1 pt)
  None Available.
• 
  Linda

  This project obviously started with Hugh Mcmahon's carvings and had a story written around it to showcase his amazing carving skills.
  
  Unfortunately because of this, the story was a bit contrived, rather than standing on it's own as an interesting and fun story.
  
  Hate to think Michael Rosen was working to a nasty deadline and didn't have time to let the carvings work their magic on his storytelling soul).
  
  From a nation of non-pumpkin-carvers the intructions at the back were very informative, and maybe even one day helpful.
• 
  SouthWestZippy

  The pumpkins no longer want to sit on the porch they want to join in the Halloween fun. I loved looking at the wonderful, creative and amazing pumpkins throughout the book. It was a fun read but I am just not fond of the story line.
• 
  Anna Nesterovich

  The pumpkins are great. There are even a few ideas we'd like to implement next time. As for the story, it's not all that great. Besides, it's not written well enough for small kids; doesn't really help with literacy, though can be entertaining.
• 
  babyhippoface

  You want to read this book for the illustrations. The story is just so-so, but those carved pumpkins are intricate and terrific.
• 
  Brandy

  My date for reading this one isn’t accurate - it’s been on our bookshelf for years (Thanks to Nana knowing it would appeal to her Halloween-loving granddaughter). The story at times is a bit awkward in its attempt to include all the different pumpkin carvings, but Violet does find it amusing that the truly scary creatures are the veggies.
• 
  Cheryl

  Gimmick. Pointless. Not funny or scary. Sorry.
• 
  Marcia Van Camp

  Funny at the end but long and didn’t love the illustrations
• 
  Kandrea Cheney

  Pictures that pop, this little story is perfect for a Halloween read with a surprising ending.
• 
  Mollie B

  silly story. Very holiday
• 
  Jean Ann

  The gifted sculptor, Hugh McMahon, uses a variety of uniquely carved pumpkins to compliment Rosen’s Halloween tale about a group of mischievous gourds plotting to leave their boring porches on Halloween night to scare unsuspecting trick-or-treaters. The photos of McMahon’s pumpkins taken by William Brinson exhibit a variety of intricately sculpted pumpkins amid simple chalk sketches. A plain black backdrop gives the book an overall feeling of spookiness and perfectly showcases the illuminated jack-o-lanterns. However, these are no ordinary jack-o-lanterns! McMahon transforms these average pumpkins into unusual characters: a spooky zombie mime, a realistic swarm of angry bees and even hungry prehistoric dinosaurs. While the photos of McMahon’s pumpkins would not tell a logical story without Rosen’s words, my children were more interested in the remarkable carvings than the story itself. McMahon’s imaginative pumpkin carvings transform a somewhat ordinary Halloween story into an extraordinary October adventure. I encourage you to visit Hugh McMahon’s website at
  www.gochelsea.com/pumpkins to view more of his amazing work. I would add this book to my library collection because of the talented McMahon's pumpkin sculptures.
• 
  Dione Basseri

  Can McMahon carve interesting pumpkins? Yes, but I've seen better on Facebook. And, combined with a really, REALLY boring story, this ends up being a pretty terrible Halloween book.
  
  A group of pumpkins decide they want to join the Halloween fun and try on different carvings as costumes. Sadly, the arrangements look horrifically photo-shopped. Oh, the carvings seem real enough, but they're just copy-pasted onto backgrounds, never seeming to quite fit. So that's really the only thing scary about this book.
  
  The "punchline" that the kids are afraid of the non-pumpkin vegetables at least helps mitigate the pumpkinhead racism spouted earlier in the book. It certainly isn't amusing.
  
  Save your personal AND library budgets and pass on this one!
• 
  Ina

  The photographs of the amazing carved pumpkins in this book are amazing and my storytime audience studied each and every picture with an intensity that they don't always possess! These pictures make up for the choppy, somewhat disjointed text. The pumpkin patch pumpkins decide that this year they want to dress up for Halloween and have fun. They form groups and compete to try and scare the trick-or-treaters. Which group proves the scariest: The small pumpkins as eyes and bees? The green pumpkins as monsters? The white pumpkins as zombie mimes?? In the end, it isn't the pumpkins that prove to be the scariest to the kids...
• 
  Kimberly

  Haha, this was actually funny and very cute. The pumpkins are trying to be the very scariest jack'o'lanterns this Halloween, in fact they are taking it to the next level, they will be going trick-or-treating and trying to scare all the trick-or-treaters this year. Whoever is the scariest wins. A pretty cute story, my kids laughed.
• 
  Amy J

  I am always on the lookout for books with cool pumpkins in them. The one thing I have to do on Halloween is carve a pumpkin and there is no better place to get great ideas than a childrens book. The story here is mediocre but the pumpkins and other vegetables, which are photographs, are marvelous.
• 
  Mti Librarian

  Great illustrations featuring a combination of chalk drawings, photographs, and pumpkin carvings.
• 
  Martha

  GREAT PICTURES!!!
• 
  Mary Ann

  Photographs of intricately carved pumpkins are amazing and will draw kids to this. But story wasn't captivating and felt a bit like a vehicle for the art.
• 
  Samantha

  Great Halloween display book. Each page features pictures of carved pumpkins and a tutorial at the end shows readers hwo to carve one of the pumpkins from the story!
  Sidenote: author is from OH
• 
  Samantha Hodge

  1 star for the story, 5 stars for the pumpkin carvings. The story bored me silly, but I could look at the carvings all day. Fascinating.
• 
  Tiffany

  The pictures of the various made jack o lanterns were cool to see. The story wasn't that exciting the names of the pumpkins were creative.
• 
  Marina

  The carved pumpkins were so cool. The story was ok but the pumpkin carvings made it extra special.
• 
  Laura McLain

  Fun story and amazing photography of carved jack-o-lanterns.
• 
  Courtney K

  Bobo wants to make these really cool jack-o-lanterns. Do you think Martha Stewart would make a house call?
• 
  Laura

  Such a charming book! The story itself is not spectacular, but it is fun enough. This book is worth looking at for the illustrations, which are composite pictures of carved pumpkins. Amazing!
• 
  Andrea

  The intricately carved pumpkins and other vegetables are what make this book! The story is just so-so.