Adopted from a Troylean folktale, this spooky story about a girl named Ottila who runs away and discovers an old house in the woods and the skull who lives there. But the skull has a secret that comes at night and Otilla discovers what it is. As the story begins, we meet Otilla, a young tan-skinned girl on the run from her old life, who stumbles upon a large house with a single occupant: a talking skull. The two strike up an immediate friendship, and when the skull confesses that a headless skeleton chases him every night, Otilla is determined to come to his aid. Keen ingenuity on her part protects her new friend, and a happy ending sees the two of them together always. Klassen balances the spooky elements of the story brilliantly alongside cozy teas and the occasional waltz. This is aided in no small part by a limited palette that depicts the slanted burnt umber rays of the rising and setting sun as well as the gentle gleam of candlelight. In a marvelous author’s note, Klassen recounts how he encountered this folktale in a school library and misremembered it in the best way. As he says, “Folktales…are supposed to be changed by who is telling them, and you never find them the same way twice.” One can only hope that children will tell and retell this reinterpretation many times to themselves throughout the years. Employing his customary pitch-perfect tonal gymnastics, only Klassen could inspire readers to want craniums as pals. The Skull will be the fifth book illustrated and written by Klassen, who has also worked with collaborators such as Mac Burnett, with whom he created Sam and Dave Dig a Hole. Klassen “loves” collaborating but might concentrate on more solo projects in future, saying: “I have enough of my own work out now that it doesn’t feel so precious or paralysing to make more. I think I’m getting looser, so maybe that means I’ll do more on my own.” Planning ahead It was the first book Klassen had written, and proved a tough sell. “We talked to nine or 10 publishers, and all but one didn’t like the ­ending.” The first nine – all ­American – urged him not to kill the fluffy bunny. The tenth was British, and she loved it. “Most British and Canadian comedy is very low-key – there’s a dryness to the humour,” says Klassen. “Whenever I go over to the UK, it’s like ‘Oh, OK! They understand the joke here. I don’t have to preface this with anything.’”

KLASSEN: And I like to go to folktale sections of, like, libraries or bookstores when you're in a different town just 'cause they usually have some random local stuff that you wouldn't find anywhere else. KLASSEN: (Reading) When it was dark, Otilla made some tea and a fire in the fireplace room. Would you give me some tea, please, said the skull. Otilla took a tea cup and poured the tea through his mouth and onto the chair. Ah, nice and warm, said the skull. Thank you.

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Klassen’s recognizable graphite-and-ink illustrations capture the haunting—yet somehow charming—atmosphere of the stark Austrian setting, where shadows loom, bones come to life, and apricot sunshine cuts through the gloom. . . . Is the story creepy? You bet, but it’s also weirdly sweet and characterized by agency, kindness, and choice. . . . Klassen’s newest offering will be highly coveted. He has a soft spot for the skull, who tries to be a good host when Otilla arrives but is ultimately just a skull rolling around on the floor. “A lot of my books are about confusion and a feeling of only being partly in control. I think there is a reason he’s a cursed skull and I was super into the idea that he wasn’t a great guy and she knows that, but she’s running away. She takes him for who he is when they meet.” Film is still important to him; indeed, he embarks on each new book with a particular film in mind. This Is Not My Hat, in which a small fish boasts of its stolen bowler before being bumped off mid-book, follows the narrative arc of Psycho, while We Found a Hat, in which two tortoises discover a fedora and can’t decide who should keep it, was inspired by The ­Treasure of the Sierra Madre, with Humphrey Bogart. Give it out at Halloween to your favorite little readers, it would even be a fun gift for an adult trust me. Children love the macabre. But just as Agatha Christie turned murder into a comfort read, so the successful children’s writer knows how to make ghoulishness cosy. In the modern picture book, ghosts are typically benevolent, and even in Roald’s Dahl’s The Witches – “This is not a fairy tale. This is about real witches” – the terror of the story is countered by the affection between the young boy and his grandmother.

Echoes of other forbidding fairy tales pervade this high-stakes telling, in which Otilla’s primal bravery and sly wit result in an arc from flight to mutual reliance.Having eaten pretty much everything on land in 13 previous versions of the classic song, Colandro’s capaciously stomached oldster goes to sea. Series fans won’t be disappointed, but young readers and listeners who know only the original ditty may find this a touch bland. Klassen’s recognizable graphite-and-ink illustrations capture the haunting—yet somehow charming—atmosphere of the stark Austrian setting, where shadows loom, bones come to life, and apricot sunshine cuts through the gloom. . . . Is the story creepy? You bet, but it’s also weirdly sweet and characterized by agency, kindness, and choice. . . . Klassen's newest offering will be highly coveted.