Prom Nights From Hell

[dem bones]

Meg Cabot, Kim Harrison, Michele Jaffe, Stephenie Meyer, Lauren Myracle - Prom Nights From Hell (HarperCollins, 2009)

Meg Cabot - The Exterminator's Daughter
Lauren Myracle - The Corsage
Kim Harrison - Madison Avery and the Dim Reaper
Michele Jaffe - Kiss and Tell
Stephenie Meyer - Hell on Earth

Blurb:

Worried that prom is gonna bite?

In this exciting collection, bestselling authors including Stephenie Meyer (Twilight) and Meg Cabot (How to Be Popular and The Princess Diaries) take bad prom dates to a whole new level - a paranormally bad level ...

Wardrobe malfunctions and two left feet are nothing compared to discovering you're dancing with the Grim Reaper - and he isn't here to tell you how hot you look.

From vampire exterminations to angels fighting demons, these five stories will be more fun than any DJ in a bad dinner jacket. No corsage or limo rental necessary - just great, sexy, scary fun!

Lauren Myracle - The Corsage: The Monkey's Paw again receives a full, grisly Tales from the Crypt treatment as Frankie resorts to black magic to secure her dream Prom date. Story opens with a visit to Madame Zanzibar the fortune teller who involuntarily supplies Frankie with the cursed corsage. Madame Z.'s shelves are stocked with suitably macabre artefacts including the skull of a dead man who rose from a grave in Chapel Hill cemetery and a "red and organ-like" something in a Tupperware container: "That's my uterus. Had the doc give it to me after my hysterectomy." We have come a long way from The Armada Ghost Book.

Michele Jaffe - Kiss And Tell: Miranda Kiss, eighteen-year-old chauffeur, cheerleader and reluctant Wonderwoman, is unwittingly entangled in a plot to abduct Sibby Cumean, a prophet in the guise of a boy-hungry fourteen year old brat. Features hunky Police Deputy Caleb Reynolds, who may or may not be the sadistic torturer known as 'The Gardener.' His hot gal is evidently game for stuff. "Wait until we get back to the house. I've got some amazing new toys, something special for you."

Liked The Corsage, wasn't quite so keen on Kiss And Tell but then I've not been a teenager for approx. 300 years. Pop Culture refs include High School Musical, Night Stalker, Pretty Woman, Richard Gere, Julia Roberts, Netflix, Lucy Lawless, Rihanna's SOS, an abundance of 'self-hel' manuals and: "The girl ... dressed like she'd been studying early Madonna videos and wanted to be sure that if mesh shirts worn over bras, fingerless gloves, teased hair, thick black eyeliner, rubber bracelets, petticoat skirts with fishnets, and ankle boots came back in style, she'd be ready."