I did not finish. I found the individual stories to be bland, and not what I was looking for in a Halloween Anthology. I imagine there is an audience for this book, I just wasn't it. Without finishing, I don't have much else to say in terms of a review. I can definitely see someone who enjoys a small amount of spook enjoying this anthology, but if you are looking for a big scare, I'd recommend passing on Blame it On the Pumpkin.

"And silhouetted against the crimson smiles, four dark featureless fighures waited. The carved eyes smoldered like nocturnal creatures."


This is a shot story collection of horror stories all centered around pumpkins. While I enjoyed most of the stories there was two that I completely skipped out on because of the poor writing. The story "Alone on Halloween" really creeped me out, I also really liked the story "Pumpkin Hollow" about the mysterious Halloween town that suddenly appears. I read this two weeks before Halloween which really helped get into that cosy fall mood.

Genre: horror, supernatural. thriller, magical realism
TW: death, blood, sexual assault, self harm, injury

I was excited to see local author Pamela Kinney’s short story “Pumpkin Hollow” in this ARC copy of Blame It On the Pumpkin Horror Anthology that will be published by DreamPunk Press in December 2022. I set up a midnight pumpkin scented candle to set up my environment, which made the descriptions of the Halloween invitation in the story extra uncanny!

I enjoyed about a third of the stories. I was puzzled that the anthology begins with a nonfiction how-to-grow-pumpkins. Fortunately, I had skipped ahead to Kinney's story to read first. I also enjoyed Jennifer Kyrnin's "Vampire Gourd" and Michael Gore "Alone on Halloween." I really wanted to like E.W. Farnsworth's "The Halloween Seances" because friends getting together for a séance on Halloween is a great premise but the overall story just didn't work for me.

This is a pretty solid and frightening anthology of scary Halloween stories from various authors. Anthologies of this kind are always a mixed bag. Some stories will appeal to you more than others and everyone will have opinions about their favourites.

I enjoyed the majority of them. I'm a sucker for a good Halloween book and I always appreciate when it's that season again and authors relish in the chance to add some extra goosebumps to your arms.

I'm not quite sure why a non-fiction story begins the book, however. It's almost like an article about how pumpkins are grown and how they make their way to us. Interesting, sure, but I'm here for the ghostly, the ghastly, and the terrifying.

Overall, you'll likely enjoy this book if you love Halloween and all things spooky season!

I really didn’t enjoy too much of this book. I think a younger audience might like it, it was kind of juvenile. A few stories were ok, but then stories were so cringy they were awful. It was neat though having a whole book to read about Halloween so close to the day. I think my favorite was Vampire Gourd.

An eclectic Anthology apropos to the Spooky Season (or inspiring frissons of fear throughout the year), BLAME IT ON THE PUMPKIN ranges from the wildly contemporary to the historical frights (17th century Salem and Witch Hunts) and will elicit many a chill any time the reader looks at a pumpkin, or a corn maze, or trick or treaters. This collection is probably best not read at night nor while home all alone.

An unmissable book for Halloween!!
Through 8 different stories, the authors of this compilation gave us a chilling experience that you will not be able to stop reading.
Pumpkin festivals in mysterious towns, plants that grow abnormally and houses of terror that take things to another level, are some of the plots that you can find here.
One of the things that I liked the most is that the setting allows you to imagine everything in detail. It is definitely one of my favorites this season.

I had to stop reading after the first story. Definitely a bummer. I may go back for a last attempt but for now, I am setting it aside.

Thank you #NetGalley and DreamPunk Press for giving me the opportunity to read this.

Ahh, a very nice Halloween anthology series. I really enjoyed the stories for the most part, there were just two stories that did not work for me. I am realizing now after reading other's reviews that some of the stories were not everyone's cup of tea. Probably because most of the readers wanted more horror and not gallows humor that seemed to run through some of the stories. I will say there are some typos in some of the stories, but since this is an ARC I am more forgiving of that. This anthology honestly reminded me a bit of the Dean Koontz "Strange Highways" short story collection he put out years ago. Some scary and then some matter of fact stories in it as well. I think that most teens would get a kick out of these stories and I honestly liked reading these while in bed trying to tell myself I don't need to put the heat on yet. October is just around the corner and I can't wait for the leaves changing, the cold weather, and the crunch as I walk by and look at houses decorated for Halloween.

From Pumpkin to Jack-o'-lantern by Marjory E. Leposky (1 star)-Honestly, I think this would have been better if it was just a prologue or something. It's a nonfiction story about how to grow pumpkins and the best way to turn them into jack-o'-lanterns and why you should use non-wax candles. I thought it was interesting, but definitely was not a great mood setter for a horror anthology. 

"Moonlit Hunt" by J.M. Silverleaf (2.5 stars)-A flash fiction story. It's not even a page. I thought it was good, but maybe this should have been the first story in the anthology. It's short, but it does set the mood better. 

"Pumpkin Hollow" by Pamela Kinney (5 stars)-I liked this, a young woman named Penny gets a mysterious invitation to a town hosting a Halloween festival and special haunt. Something about the invitation calls to her. She ends up inviting her three friends and one of her friend's then invites his girlfriend. The five of them don't realize what they are walking into. This honestly reminded me a lot of R.L. Stine's "Fear Street" books so I loved it. You just read and go, well that's a terrible idea.

"Vampire Gourd" by Jennifer Kyrnin (5 stars)-A man that takes his gardening way too seriously. I loved this. Part of me wondered what was real or not real after a while in this story. I honestly don't know if it's possible to grow gourds as large as this guy was doing after a while. But for readers who want some blood and gore, this tale has it in spades. 

"Nasty Old B!tch" by S.P. Mount (3.5 stars)-Look I get this wasn't everyone's favorite, but I did laugh a bit. A woman named Myrtle (or is it?) who is in her 90s and is determined to give her town a Halloween they will never forget. Just like in "Vampire Gourd" though, I was left wondering was this real or not real. Because you are given some context clues about Myrtle that has you wondering. 

 "Flock of Badb" by S.P. Mount (4 stars)-I don't know, this one cracked me up. It's about a young woman named Wilhelmina Lee who has been told there's a curse that runs in her family that will turn her into a raven when she turns 21. There is a lot going on in this story. Mainly about sometimes the object of your desire are not great people and it's cool to just realize you have grown past high school crushes. I felt for Wilhelmina who is constantly told how unattractive she is, and is dealing with losing both her parents and not realizing if the whole curse thing is real or not real. There are several scenes though that I just cracked up at, mostly at the end. 

"Alone on Halloween" by Michael Gore (5 stars)-What a great story. The only criticism that I do have is that I wanted more backstory on what exactly Nick did. We know that he is very into Halloween and that last year he did something "bad" that resulted in some deaths. But I wanted to know more. The whole story and how it unwound was great. You kept thinking the story was going some way, but then it changed. It does a nice job of really giving you the feeling of a town in the midst of Halloween and a young teen who is troubled by something he did in the past and wants to do better. Only question is, will he be allowed to. 

"Dance of Masks and Fire The Witchfinder's Shadow by Greg Patrick (4.5 stars)-I really do like how this story showcased lines from other famous works dealing witches and other scary things such as "The House of the Seven Gables" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow".  But the excerpts started to take me out of the main story too much for me to give it a full 5 stars. I wanted to more fully follow the story of the witchfinder and the witch who cursed him. It's definitely a more horror filled story than some of the others. 

Trick or Treat: Once Upon a Hunter's Moon (3.5 stars)-This one had a lot of typos through it. Since the preceding story followed a Mr. Elmer and then this one mentioned one too so I thought the stories were connected, but then realized the man's name changed to Mr. Elmore. I thought the overall story though, a man who is about to be turned into a trick or a treat was solid, but I needed once again more backstory to fully get into this one. 

"The Halloween Seances" by E.W. Farnsworth (1 star)-Four friends getting together for a séance on Halloween. I can't say I really enjoyed this one. Some of the wording at times made the story sound old fashioned which made it hard to get into. It just felt like a badly written play after a while. Also no one would call themselves or they family "gypsies" and I really went huh on that even being including. There were also typos in it too that did make it a bit hard to stay in the story.

While some of the stories in this book were spooky and some downright creepy, the majority of them were drawn out and had severe grammar issues. A few stories in the book had me looking to see if the authors had written anything else, but those were few and far between.

I think that some of the stories could have been really good with a little extra editing. However, the grammar and having to read multiple sentences twice, sometimes three times, to understand what was being said took me out of the story and ruined the creepiness factor for many of them.

Thank you Netgalley for this copy of Blame it on the Pumpkin. I’m sorry to say I had to DNF about 28% of the way through. The plot of the stories had good intent behind them but unfortunately the execution just was not there. There were many grammatical errors, spelling mistakes and issues with sentence structure. I love a good spooky read but unfortunately this just didn’t do it for me.

Unfortunately there were only a few stand out stories, ‘The Vampire Gourd’ and ‘Alone on Halloween’, the rest of the collection left a lot to be desired. Firstly, technical editing is needed as there were countless SPAG and formatting errors. Secondly, the rest of the collection should be contend edited. Many of the stories had an interesting story line but the delivery was not successful due to poor pacing, too much telling rather than showing, and repetition of the same phrases which did not come across as a stylistic choice but rather a result of not being able to find other descriptors.

‘The Vampire Gourd’ and ‘Alone on Halloween’ stood out as they had pacing which created an atmosphere and quickly pulled the reader into the world they were creating. Characters intentions were better explored and thus decisions they made and actions they took added to creating a tale that felt realistic within its own context.

I love all things Halloween and this did not disappoint, thank you SO much NetGalley for allowing me the opportunity to dive into this read just before Spooky Season! The short stories were wondering and I LOVED it.

Blame it on the Pumpkin is a collection of horror stories...about pumpkins..Some of them are funny..some of them are not. I didn't like it overall.

DNF'd @ approx. 15% - Review will be brief
Rating: 3/5 Stars simply because this isn't bad, it's just mislabeled.

Thank you to NetGalley and DreamPunk Press for letting me read this ebook before release. Unfortunately I think there is some miscommunication about the book. I read the first three short stories in the book.

I was first just confused because it was labeled a horror anthology... but the first story was nonfiction? There was nothing scary about it. It was a guide to making a jack o' lantern. Like... legitimately.

Second story was a short flash fiction piece. It was okay. I don't like flash fiction so it didn't do much for me. I have no complaints, it wasn't bad at all.

Third story was when I realized this wasn't going to work out. I am most definitely not the target audience for this book. The writing is very middle grade but the topics are more young adult, so I'd like to shelf it in-between the two. The writing was very simplistic and it just didn't read like adult horror to me. It wasn't bad, it just wasn't the right read for me. I might give this to my teenage brother instead, but I just think this can't be labeled adult.

For example, "'Annie here.' 'I know.' The other woman sounded puzzled. 'Wait. How did you...' 'Caller ID.' 'Oh, yeah I'd forgotten about that." It doesn't read like adult characters, and it doesn't read like adult writing. It felt like watching middle schoolers interact. Not women and men.

In the end, I don't have anything bad to say about the book, I don't have anything good to say either, it's just not for me.

Rating System:
★ - Avoid at all costs. Don't even look at it.
★★ - I would recommend for people not to read it.
★★★ - It was okay. I might recommend for certain people.
★★★★ - I'd recommend it to most people.
★★★★★ - I'd literally gift this to someone. Must read.

This was a quick and easy to read horror short story collection that I read in one sitting. They were twisty and had a slevel of darkness and scare but I think that this would be better marketed towards a younger audience such as young adult as I felt like for adults it could have been darker. I did enjoy it though,

Blame it on the Pumpkin is a collection of various spooky tales that ultimately fails to deliver any true chills or thrills. The short stories are mostly quick and easy to read, and some -like Pumpkin Hollow - delivery some good twists and imagery. These stories as a collection felt more YA than adult and may have more success with a younger crowd. Overall, if you’re a reader just dipping a toe into spooky stories or you prefer lighter Halloween stories, then you may enjoy this collection.

2.75 stars

This was a fun collection of short stories. I enjoy my horror with a little more depth and scares though. This would be very good for a younger audience or someone just dipping their toes into the genre. It was a nice break from the more intense horror I read though.

Excellent concept, but the stories didn’t capture and hold my interest. Fortunately this is a good stepping stone for new authors however I feel like the editors should have provided more feedback before finalizing the print copy.

DNF.

I wished I loved this more than I did, it was okay for me. I usually love scary story compilations like this. I went in thinking this would be scarier than it was. I did like the 1st and 4th stories the most. I did love all of the pumpkins, and Halloween spirit anyways. Thank you to Netgalley and DreamPunk Press for letting me read this!