It was Dad’s idea, of course. He’s into all that survival stuff. His idea of a family holiday is crossing the Sahara by camel. We had to drink our own pee. Last year it was Siberia. I lost three toes to frostbite. So when the auditions for a new TV show called Extreme Jungle Family Challenge came up he was first in line. The idea was simple; drop an “ordinary” family into the Amazon rainforest with a couple of video cameras and…

Scratch. Scratch. The sound pulls me from sleep. I burrow under the blankets, try to ignore it. Scratch, scratch. But I can’t. I sigh, and stretch. I’ll have to get up and let the dog into my bedroom, won’t I? He's not allowed, but Mum and Dad are away tonight. No one will know. Scratch, scratch. I open my eyes, then they snap open wider. Next to me, on the bed? The dog. His eyes stare back at mine, and then at the door.…

The house at the end of the street looked quite ordinary, at first glance. It had four windows, each wearing fussy net curtains, a sturdy blue front door and flower-filled hanging baskets on either side of the porch. The number thirteen glittered in the morning sunlight. If it hadn’t been for the two stone lions at the edge of the driveway, I might have continued on my way to school and never noticed anything unusual at…

I have a photographic memory. I only have to see something once, and I never forget it.

It’s my party piece. It’s what I always do for school talent shows. I get people from the audience to call out names, dates, strings of numbers, bits of poetry. I write them all on the whiteboard, look at it once, then I get them blindfold me and recite them all back.…

I found it in the shed at the bottom of the garden, in the dark, at the back.  Hidden. Whoever put it there didn’t want it to be found. I would never have come across it if I hadn’t got locked in. While I waited for the others to find me I started foraging around to relieve the boredom.  Luckily I had a torch and that’s how I saw it, sticking out from between the pages of an old telephone directory. I opened the book and for several minutes I…

It snowed in the night.  By the time I woke up, the snow was so deep that it came halfway up the windows, filling the house with a strange, eerie light.  The fields around were white and smooth, all the way to the dark woods beyond, and the road was completely hidden.  We were snowed in.

‘Fantastic!’ said my brother.  ‘Let’s dig our way out and make an igloo!’…

I remember that we were laughing.  I know we weren't looking where we were going, but why should we have expected anything to go wrong?  We took that shortcut every day.  We always threw our school bags over the wall and then climbed over after them.  I was already dropping down on the other side when I realised that I’d heard a splash.  Where there used to be solid ground, there was water, and I couldn't stop myself falling in....

Dead things can sound alive when they choose to. Dead things can move around.

        At first nothing woke fourteen-year-old Elliott. Tucked up warmly in bed, he failed to notice the mysterious sounds. He didn’t hear the eerie whispered rhymes. Or the sighs. Or the footsteps. Those footsteps came lightly and swiftly towards him – someone or something running incredibly fast up…

One step. Just one step is all that it will take. As I stand upon the cliff edge, I wonder if I’m prepared for this. I’ve triple-checked everything. But there is still the chance that something will go terribly wrong. The countdown in my head has begun...3...2...1...

I don't even know why I said it. I didn't plan to... I was just so fed up of listening to Kelsey and Tasha and Jayde talking about their boyfriends, fed up of feeling left out.

'This must be so boring for you, Jo,' Tasha said, her blue eyes laughing. 'Listening to us going on about boys when you've never even had a date.'…

How long have I been asleep? Days......weeks.....months? Down here in the dark , locked away, out of sight. The others are still sleeping, the boy, the girl, their parents but......I’m not the only thing awake down here. Something’s with us , something lurking in the shadows , something.......wrong. I can hear it walking – no not walking, skulking creeping across the floor, over the supplies, over the equipment keeping the others alive. I can…

The ball sailed through the air, ready to be walloped at just the right time. My contact was sweet and – PING! It flew into the net.

‘YES!!!!!!!!!!’ I screamed, pulling my red jersey over my head and hopping around like a crazy rabbit.

Waves the size of houses tossed the trawler back and forth like matchwood. The storm had taken the Captain by surprise. Never in his thirty years at the helm had he seen a front move in with such speed, black clouds moving with preternatural fury.

What had summoned them, the captain didn’t know. He knew the sea held secrets it was reluctant to surrender. Out here there were…

Daisy Smith was afraid of the cracks in the pavement. She avoided stepping on them. Not because of some stupid game at school or an ant phobia or something. No. Daisy had bigger issues than that. She was the only girl in Stimpson who knew the truth about what lay beneath the paving slabs. And worse, she was only one who knew that it wasn't staying down there... not for much longer...

I don't care what they say, it's not my fault.

I know I was there and I know how it looks to the outside world, but I'll say it again, it's not my fault.

So, it isn't fair that I'm sitting here in this dark room, with these people (at least I think they are people) staring at me. They all think I'm to blame - and I…

Everybody was excited about the trip to Spain. We hadn't seen my older sister Beth for a month. She was working on the Costa Del Sol for the summer before starting university. The mystery started the moment we arrived at Malaga Airport. Beth wasn't there to meet us. Worse still, when we got to the apartment block where she lived, the caretaker said he hadn't seen her for two days. Suddenly, Mum and Dad were worried. We stood in the street,…