Katherine Arden’s imagination is a wonderful treat. Small Spaces is a wonderfully told spooky story for any middle-grade reader. I give this book a 5 out of star rating. This gave me old Goosebumps series vibes which amazing because I loved Goosebumps growing up.

“Avoid large places at night. Keep to small.”

	We follow our many characters, Ollie, not Olivia as she and two friends try to escape the evil cornfields. Ollie who loves reading stumbles upon a book that tells a story that may pray not sound like the story of the spooky tale surrounding the local farm. While on a class trip Ollie is warned that her class may be in danger. So when the bus suddenly breaks down on their way back to school our spooky tale really begins. Ollie gets off the bus heeding the warning she was given however, no one believes her. The only person who believes her is the new girl Coco who is an even bigger outcast then Ollie. Brian the hockey star is such a Boy Scout and a gentleman that he can’t in good conscience little these two girls go off by themselves. There is safety in numbers after all (everyone knows that) and they should all stay on the bus and wait for help. However, Ollie and Coco are not listening to him and walk off to find their own safety and Brian reluctantly follows them. Soon Coco and Brian are glad that they followed Ollie off the bus because their classmates all disappeared from the bus. The trio goes into the woods and tries to find a way out of the nightmare they seem to find themselves in.
	The characters in this book are created with such realism that it's easy to like them. Coco is a tiny ball of fun. She is super clumsy as they walk through the woods but the girl can climb like a monkey. She brings an interesting contrast to the other characters. Expect in the beginning she cried like every five minutes over stupid things that most people would have let roll off their shoulders. But thankfully her character grows and she becomes more confident and is able to “roll with the punches”. Brian was a boy jock who has a good side but rarely shows it. He thought he needed to be the protector of the two girls but soon realized the girls could handle themselves. He made a great supporting character.
	I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone who likes R.L. Stine’s middle-grade novels. This is such a great, super easy, and fast read. Great job to Katherine Arden for telling such a great story. I cannot wait to read the next book.

I received a free copy of this book from the author. I had the opportunity to review or not.

Are you afraid of scarecrows? Perhaps you should be. Three youngsters on a class trip found out that scarecrows were not to be ignored. Olivia, who preferred to be called Ollie, Coco, and Brian entered a nightmare of terror when their bus broke down on the return trip from a local farm where they spent an afternoon learning all about life on a farm. 

Ms. Arden presented a tale filled with ordinary farm life and turned it into a fight for survival for three sixth graders who needed all the skills they had learned scouting, reading a very special book, and a knack for solving problems in order to save themselves and their classmates from an eternity of servitude of horror. The characters in this tale were endearing and likable. The story was well-written and the world they lived in was believable and realistic. 

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys horror stories, young or old. It is well worth the read.

Imagine sitting around a campfire when the ghost stories start.  You move a little closer to the fire, hoping it will keep the dark shadows away, but keep looking over your shoulder to make sure nothing is there.  That's the spooky, creepy, feeling you get when reading Small Spaces.  When local lore is proven to be anything except lore, you just keep moving...and stay to the small.  Absolutely love it!!!!

This book was ok. Maybe I had higher hopes and it just didn't hold up. I could definitely see people enjoying it. It was spooky but not TOO spooky. Good for middle grade. The story just didn't hold me in the whole time.

Slow build up to the action. I found my mind straying a lot, despite wanting to find out more because the concept/plot was intriguing. There was just too much build up and not enough action, unfortunately.

When Ollie stumbles on a book telling the chilling story of two brothers and the ominous "smiling man", she thinks she's found the perfect distraction to keep her from thinking about the tragic loss of her own mother and the growing distance between her and her father.  What started as an engrossing distraction soon becomes threatening as Ollie has her own run in with the Smiling Man with the fate of her entire class hanging in the balance.  Katherine Arden has managed to find that perfect balance of delightful creepiness without being too creepy for the age of the intended audience.  Readers will find themselves keeping an extra eye on the next scarecrow they encounter!

When the mist rises and the smiling man comes walking, you must avoid large places at night. Keep to small. 

A quick and perfect read for Halloween.

I like to sometimes read middle grade horror stories because that is how I fell in love with reading. I spent many years reading R.L. Stein books (and by that I mean Fear Street) and then reading all the books that were recommended at the back of those books. This book ranks up there with those books and hit me with such nostalgic feelings.

This story has a creepy bus driver, The Smiling Man, and scarecrow that chase you. Ollie and her two friends Brian and Coco are on a doomed field trip where they end up trying to survive and save their classmates at the same time.

I just found out there is a sequel...I’ll be in line with all the other grade schoolers.

Small Spaces is a fun and spooky middle grade book that can be enjoyed at any age. I enjoyed this book and didn't find it to be too scary for a young audience to enjoy. That said, there are themes of death and kidnapping, so it's best to be sure your kids are mature enough to handle that and discuss with them as appropriate.

This was a very cute, very fun middle grade book. I enjoyed the little nudges at being a good person but also loved the nods to other books and stories to keep the adventure going. I liked that the kids weren't all good or all bad, just kids trying to be good people (making mistakes but also being really smart). The creepy and spooky parts were well done too, keeping it good and creepy and the lore and mystery were well done. I liked this one.

Really great Middle Grade fiction. Very well written, as I've come to expect from Katherine Arden, with impressively realistic 6th grade characters, and just the right amount of scary. A perfect Fall read.

Happy Halloween season everyone! A great way to kick it off is with Katherine Arden's Small Spaces that just released last week.

This is a story for the middle grade reader, but can be enjoyed by parents as well.

This is a creepy book about death and the bargains we make to overcame our sadness. Young Olivia has to face the sudden, tragic loss of her mother. Instead she decides to find solace in books and ignore reality. But she bit off a little more than she could chew with Small Spaces.

This is seriously a great book to be reading during Halloween season. I was appropriately freaked out. It has that perfect Halloween ick factor that makes your skin crawl while you read it. Yet I couldn't put the book down.

The main characters are a little flat and become overshadowed by some truly creepy background characters, like the smiling man and his henchmen. But I was okay with that as the villains seemed to be the most important part of the story.

The conclusion is a great way to explore how kids deal with loss in their life and build a new world around them. I highly recommend this novel.

Small Spaces is Katherine Arden’s debut middle grade novel and I loved it so much! This was like Scooby-Doo meets Jeepers Creepers but PG lol. I wasn't sure what this was going to hold for me, but it hooked me right away. This had me a little scared but mostly spooked. The scary love letter about what happened on the farm and how Johnathan felt losing his brother. Then beth feeling lost with out her husband. so sad. The actually story itself was good and I wanted to know more, and the story Beth wrote was so good! I forgot at times that we were reading a story within a story. Great spooky book to start off October. This is also a great book on having to heal after loss, making friends, and learning to move on when you are ready. I love it and can't wait to buy it. Thank you Netgalley and Katherine Arden for this ARC

I was expecting a fun, spooky read, but got so much more! Small Spaces deals with topics like coping with grief, bullying, unlikely friendships, stereotypes, and the power of books! The main character is in 6th grade, so I can TOTALLY see myself pitching this to my class as a read aloud during October - students will choose it for the spook factor, and stay for the characters and complexity. Highly recommend!

I've never read a book by Katherine Arden before, and I can see why people like her. Small Spaces is a paranormal mystery for middle grade, which is well-written and spooky. Most of the characters are developed well, although I lost track of some of the classmates who were only mentioned a few times. The scarecrows gave the book a very Halloween feel, which I really appreciated. I did not expect the level of creepiness that I found in this middle grade book. I love a spooky story, and this one was an enjoyable and quick read.

If you have a young reader who loves scary things and/or Goosebump books, Small Spaces is perfect for them.


Middle schooler Ollie stops a woman from throwing a book, Small Spaces, into the river one night. As she reads it, she learns about the smiling man and the bargain he strikes with people. When they strike a bargain with the smiling man they'll eventually disappear and no one can find them. 

The next day, Ollie and her classmates go to a local farm and it may be the home of the smiling man. That night, Ollie along with two of her classmates, Coco and Brian, are in for a night of terror as they try to stop the smiling man from making their classmates his next victims along with themselves.



The book was a quick read and gave me nostalgia for the Goosebumps books I read growing up. I'll be excited to see how this series continues with future books. This is also a good spooky read for adults who don't want anything too scary. Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for an e-copy of this book.

What a delightfully creepy novel. Small Spaces is one of those novels that is perfect for those dark and stormy nights, or even just at night in general. Arden did a fantastic job with this piece. She created an unputdownable novel about a young girl sucked into another world outside our own, a world between life and death set in a cornfield with creepy scarecrows that come to life as the sun sets. It is wonderful. Arden’s language and tone create a beautiful setting, beginning with nothing spectacular but undoubtedly eerie, as Ollie heads home after school one day. It seems like nothing remarkable, but Arden weaves in a remarkable eerie tone to unleash unease onto the reader.

From the opening pages, something is unsettling about everything happening around Ollie. She rescues a book from someone who seems deranged and heads home, discovering something eerie and mesmerizing about the novel she is reading. Moreover, when she goes on a school field trip, she discovers something scarier. Her watch is guiding her, helping her along, as her school bus breaks down, fog rolls in, and silence settles around her. For Ollie and her two friends, it is a journey to not only save themselves but to unravel the mystery and save their class as well.

It is incredibly perfect how the story moves, maintaining that spooky element, there is also something mature in the storytelling. Ollie lost her mother in a tragic accident sometime before the novel begins. She is still reeling, trying to move on with her life, but she is not going about it healthily. Ollie isolates herself and lingers on the past, often lingering on the event through hints given to the reader by descriptions tone. However, through the watch and through the events that follow, Ollie learns to make peace with her mothers’ death and learns that her mother is always with her, allowing her to open up again in school and move on.

Small Spaces is a fantastic novel that is incredibly spooky that deals with mature themes making for an incredible read.

This book was like a ghost story and a portal fantasy all in one. I did really enjoy it. It was fun! The characters were great and the setting was appropriately spooky. I mean what is creepier than a corn maze with scarecrows? I totally didn’t see the reveal coming! I kind of wish the “portal” part of the story was a little bit more obvious. But overall I really enjoyed this book and I’m looking forward to the next in the series!

This book was the perfect spooky read for Fall! I cannot wait to pick up the next one! The story telling is completely immersive, I was drawn in from the first page. Very happy I was approved for this one!

I really enjoyed this book. I loved the characters and the storyline. The story want something I would normally read but I was pleasantly surprised by how original the story was. I have recommended this book to many people since reading it because of the amazing and original story line and how fascinating the story was.

I liked this book a lot. It held my attention throughout and made me want to stay up late reading! :)