There are few things I loved more as a new mom than building out my child’s library. Now that my oldest is 10 and she’s gained two baby sisters over the years, our children’s book collection has become enormous — especially for Halloween. I hadn’t ever considered Halloween books until my baby girl was about 2, and then suddenly I couldn’t get enough. I bought Room on the Broom, Goodnight Goon, It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, and was just about to check out when I saw it and my entire childhood twinkled in front of me: The Witches’ Supermarket by Susan Meddaugh.
It was the cover that pulled me in, and suddenly — even though I couldn’t remember my parents buying me Halloween-specific books — the memories came flooding back. Of reading this story over and over, of imagining what it would be like to find a secret supermarket just for witches, of wishing I could live in a place like Helen where I could trick-or-treat alone with my dog. Everything about it was perfect. I bought it immediately, and it quickly became one of my daughters’ favorite Halloween books.
To me, The Witches’ Supermarket is the perfect Halloween book.
If you’re looking at the cover and feeling that warm, fuzzy blanket of nostalgia wrap over you, welcome. If you’re also looking at the cover and thinking, “Where do I know that dog?” I’ve got you. The Witches’ Supermarket, while not labeled as such, is actually the very first book featuring Martha, the dog of Martha Speaks, the incredibly popular children’s book series of the ‘90s. (Yes, it later became a PBS show.)
And that’s just the start of this magical story.
Helen is just a little girl dressed in a witch costume (a very popular choice that year, we later find out), enjoying Halloween with her dog Martha — whom she has dressed as a cat, much to Martha’s chagrin. (“I’m sorry you don’t like your costume, but witches have cats, not dogs. Everybody knows that,” Helen apologizes.) But on their way out to the festivities, they see a woman drop a coupon on the ground for a broom and try to follow her to return it. When they do catch up to the secret doorway she’s entered, they realize pretty quickly that they’ve stumbled into a supermarket just for witches. And chaos, as you can guess, ensues.
But it’s the delightful illustrations and all the sweet details that really set this story apart from so many other Halloween books. It’s magical and obviously about witches, but the book isn’t trying to be some kind of cutesy, trendy thing. You can tell Meddaugh didn’t just decide to write a Halloween book and then pick witches out of the many Halloween characters — the book is written clearly as an answer to how witches live among us. What happens to witches on Halloween? If witches could be our neighbors, where do they buy their frog legs and eyes of newts? If witches are out flying around, where do they get their broomsticks?
Like Diagon Alley before J.K. Rowling came on the scene.
And in a pretty consistent theme of Halloween entertainment, Helen is a kid out there on her own. We have a few Halloween books that are themed around just the holiday itself, with lots of baby and parent interaction, but there’s something so sweet and lovely about a story where the main character is a kid and that’s it. She’s calling the shots, it’s her adventure, and at the end of the day, she gets to keep it all to herself.
In a world where so few freedoms are bestowed upon kids — and when you try to give them a little bit extra, you’re just setting yourself up for judgment — it’s so fun to read a book where the kid gets to do her own thing. It’s not always realistic, of course, but reading this back in the early ‘90s and rereading it now gives me that same feeling of excitement and independent energy. Like if Helen and Martha can survive getting lost in a witches’ supermarket, then what can’t I do?
The Witches’ Supermarket also has all of those little Halloween tropes you love without being an obvious kind of picture book. There are witches, and there are pumpkins, and there are kids in costumes spilling out on the sidewalk. There are black cats and a dog furious at those cats and a whole lot of flying brooms. And, at the end, there is a mom who has no clue what just happened.
So, go ahead and order yourself a copy of The Witches’ Supermarket. You’ll be instantly transported to your elementary school library, where all you have to worry about is getting the good seat by the window and hoping it’s rectangle pizza for lunch again. The illustrations will take you right back, and you’ll be ready to push for all the sweet and simple Halloween moments you forgot about. (Like letting your kids wander busy city streets alone, of course.)
