Don't Open It! Read online

  These are the last days of the Library of Doom.

  The forces of villainy are freeing the Library’s most dangerous books. Only one thing can stop Evil from penning history’s final chapter — the League of Librarians, a mysterious collection of heroes who only appear when the Library faces its greatest threat.

  Some things are better left unopened . . .

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  THE LITTLE DOOR

  Chapter 2

  DON’T OPEN IT!

  Chapter 3

  PRISONERS OF THE NEST

  Chapter 4

  OPEN IT!

  Chapter 5

  DEFEATING EVIL

  Chapter 1

  THE LITTLE DOOR

  Two girls walk along a DARK sidewalk.

  Tree branches block the moonlight.

  It is late.

  The girls, Anna and Rose, are leaving a friend’s birthday party. They each carry a box filled with leftover cake.

  “Race you home!” Anna shouts. She laughs and quickly runs away.

  Rose doesn’t run after her friend.

  She knows Anna is faster.

  Rose sighs. She keeps walking.

  Anna keeps running. She turns a corner.

  Up ahead, a SHADOW stands next to the sidewalk. Anna stops a few feet away.

  A tiny wooden box sits atop a wooden post. It looks like a birdhouse.

  Anna steps closer. It’s a lending library, she realizes. I love these!

  Anna reaches toward the library’s small door. She lifts a rusty hook and unlocks it.

  CREAK! The wooden door swings open.

  Anna reaches in.

  A scaly claw reaches out.

  Chapter 2

  DON’T OPEN IT!

  Rose hears a terrifying scream.

  She calls out, “Anna! Where are you?”

  Rose runs down the sidewalk. She turns the corner.

  Something white is on the sidewalk. Rose picks it up.

  It is Anna’s cake box.

  CREAK! A small lending library sits on a post a few feet away.

  Rose hadn’t noticed it before.

  The little house is rocking in the wind. Every time it rocks, it creaks.

  Rose knows how much Anna likes books.

  Rose walks over to the small wooden house.

  She looks closer.

  Cake frosting is smeared on the edge of the door.

  Rose carefully lifts the rusty hook.

  The door opens with a BANG!

  A scaly claw grabs Rose’s arm.

  Before she can scream, the claw pulls her inside.

  Then the door slams shut.

  The wooden post rocks back and forth.

  POP! The post pushes itself up from the ground.

  Two huge, scaly feet sprout from the post.

  They look like the feet of a giant crow. The wrinkled claws scrape the sidewalk.

  Two white boxes rest on the concrete.

  The feet squash them as the lending library scurries away.

  Chapter 3

  PRISONERS OF THE NEST

  Rose opens her eyes. She screams.

  She is standing in a giant bird’s nest.

  The nest is made from ripped book covers and torn pages.

  A dozen ENORMOUS eggs rest in the center.

  One of the eggs rocks back and forth.

  Rose steps closer.

  She hears a girl’s voice. It is Anna’s voice.

  It is coming from inside the egg.

  “Hey!” someone whispers.

  Rose turns around.

  A boy is peeking out from behind a pile of old books.

  “Over here!” he says.

  There are others hiding with the boy.

  “I have to help my friend,” says Rose.

  “You shouldn’t have SCREAMED,” says the boy. “Now the bird monster will swallow you.”

  “Monster?” Rose says, trembling. “Monsters only exist in fairy tales.”

  A dark-haired girl stares at her.

  “Then how did your friend get inside that egg?” she asks.

  CREAK! CREAK!

  A loud screeching sound fills the air.

  They cover their ears.

  A vast shadow appears over them.

  A monstrous bird flaps above them.

  Its wings are dark and dirty.

  Its feathers are made of shredded book covers and sharp hooks.

  Its eyes are the color of rust.

  The bird turns one eye toward Rose. It screams.

  Chapter 4

  OPEN IT!

  “Get away!” shouts Rose. “Get away!”

  The giant bird lunges at Rose with its beak. She SCREAMS and takes a step back.

  The dark-haired girl catches Rose before she falls.

  The two girls hold each other. They lean against an old book and catch their breath.

  The tattered cover of the old book begins to glow.

  Rose reads the title. ROSE RED AND SNOW WHITE. It is her favorite fairy tale.

  She sees the other girl’s hand is still on the book, too.

  An idea hatches in Rose’s brain. “What is your name?” Rose asks.

  “Blanche,” says the dark-haired girl. “It means White.”

  “I knew it!” says Rose.

  She opens the book. The pages glow even brighter. Then the light takes the shape of a young man in red.

  Chapter 5

  DEFEATING EVIL

  “Get down,” the man in red says.

  He aims a glowing red hand at the bird flapping above them.

  The creature screams. Wings shatter.

  Pages rain down on the nest. It bursts into a ball of light.

  Crack! The eggs hatch. People climb out of the broken shells. Rose runs to hug Anna.

  Rose turns to the man in red. “Who are you?” she asks.

  “The Red Librarian,” the man says. “I’ve been hunting that Digest Bird for ages. It escaped from the Library of Doom long ago.”

  “But how did you get here?” asks Rose.

  “You and your new friend shared the right book at the right time,” says the Red Librarian. “Sometimes that’s all it takes to destroy evil.”

  A gust of wind chills them to their bones. They close their eyes.

  When they open their eyes, they are back on the sidewalk.

  Th
e lending library is GONE.

  On the cement are two new white boxes. Inside each box is a fresh piece of cake.

  GLOSSARY

  bloodshot (BLUHD-shot)—

  if someone’s eyes are bloodshot, their eyes have many red lines from a lack of sleep, illness, or stress.

  devour (di-VOW-er)—

  to quickly eat all of something in a way that shows that you are very hungry

  digest (DYE-jest)—

  the biological process of changing food that you have eaten into simpler forms that can be used by the body. Digest can also refer to a magazine or collection of written material like literature.

  lunge (LUHNJ)—

  a sudden forward or downward movement done in a forceful or aggressive way

  monstrous (MON-struhss)—

  extremely large, vicious mean, beastly, or violent

  shattered (SHAT-erd)—

  if you shattered something, you destroyed something by breaking it into many pieces

  tattered (TAT-erd)—

  old, torn, worn, or falling apart

  DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

  1. Have you ever seen a small lending library? Would you borrow any books from one? How come?

  2. The Red Librarian wears a uniform of leather. Since he works with books, why do you think he has a uniform like that?

  3. Why do you think the giant bird was trapping young people in the libraries? What did it want?

  WRITING PROMPTS

  1. When Rose and the dark-haired girl touched the same book, the Red Librarian was summoned. What do you think the title of that book means? Make up your own title and write a short description of what you think the book was about.

  2. The Red Librarian calls the monstrous bird in this story a “Digest.” Read the two meanings of the word “digest” in the glossary on the previous page. Write about why it’s a good or bad name for the creature, and why.

  3. The hero in this book is the Red Librarian. He has several special abilities and powers. Make a list of the ones he uses in this story. Then write about which one you would want to have for yourself.

  THE AUTHOR

  Michael Dahl is the prolific author of the bestselling Goodnight, Baseball picture book and more than 200 other books for children and young adults. He has won the AEP Distinguished Achievement Award three times for his nonfiction, a Teachers’ Choice Award from Learning magazine, and a Seal of Excellence from the Creative Child Awards. He is also the author of the Hocus Pocus Hotel mystery series and the Dragonblood books. Dahl currently lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

  THE ILLUSTRATOR

  Bradford Kendall has enjoyed drawing for as long as he can remember. As a boy, he loved to read comic books and watch old monster movies. He graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design with a BFA in Illustration. He has owned his own commercial art business since 1983. Bradford lives in Providence, Rhode Island, with his wife, Leigh, and their two children, Lily and Stephen.

  The Library of Doom: The Final Chapters is published by

  Stone Arch Books

  A Capstone Imprint

  1710 Roe Crest Drive

  North Mankato, Minnesota 56003

  www.mycapstone.com

  © 2016 Stone Arch Books

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.

  Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available at the Library of Congress website.

  ISBN: 978-1-4965-2558-1 (library binding)

  ISBN: 978-1-4965-2570-3 (eBook)

  ISBN: 978-1-4965-3894-9 (eBook)

  Designer: Hilary Wacholz

  Summary: Late one night, two friends hurry home after a birthday party ends. On the way, they spy a small lending library that hadn’t been there before the party. When they open the little door and browse the books, a claw reaches out and pulls the girls inside! They find themselves trapped in a dark world with a shadowy beast that has a taste for voracious readers . . .

 

 

  Michael Dahl, Don't Open It!

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