Paul van Loon’s ‘Der Gruselbus’ is my next read of the year.
I started reading this in time for Halloween, in my quest to better my German skills. The German in this book was trickier than in R. L. Stine’s ‘Goosebumps/Gänsehaut’ books. But it wasn’t too difficult to the point of incomprehension.
The story follows a class of children and their teacher as they embark upon the titular bus. A driver in a skeleton costume and a strange man on this bus greet them. The stranger is a writer with ten strange objects and a short story to go along with them. Between each tale, the tale of the children on the bus—hearing these stories—progresses. It’s all quite meta, especially for a children’s book.
I had a blast with this book. It’s the most entertaining book I’ve read in German so far. Despite the intended audience, some tales are bleak and gruesome. They had me on the edge of my seat—quite a feat for a kid’s book. The fact that the book consists of several stories, each about ten pages or so, keeps the book feeling fresh. It helps when reading a book in a foreign language.
I would read other books from Paul van Loon in the future.
On to the next German book!
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