10. The Jungle Vampire by David Sinden

The Jungle Vampire by David Sinden, Mattew Morgan & Guy Macdonald; illustrated by Jonny Duddle (Canada) - (US)
An Awfully Beastly Business, Book 4

Pages: 204
Ages: 8+
Finished: Jan. 19, 2010
First Published: Dec. 29, 2009
Genre: children, fantasy
Rating: 5/5

First sentence:

Late one night, on the outskirts of a grimy town, a man in a long fur coat hurried through the rain.

Acquired: Received a review copy from Simon & Schuster Canada.

Reason for Reading: My son loves this series and this was the next one out. I read it aloud to him.

Summary: All the members of the RSPCB are off to the jungle and this time Ulf is invited along as he is in training to become an official member and his mission takes him in search of a legendary vampire. Unbeknownst to all, Baron Marackai is after the same treasure only he wants to kill the fabled beast and he is following them to take advantage of their smarts on finding this creature's den.

Comments: Everything one has come to expect from this series is present in this latest addition. The authors keep the story fresh even though Baron Marackai is after Ulf and his friends in every book, Sinden, et al. find different ways of bringing the two parties together and we've come to enjoy waiting for that moment that the RSPCB finds out that Baron Marackai is behind their troubles. This particular book is an action packed story. Briefly starting at home they are off to the jungle very quickly, where they meet adventure after adventure. The whole team is included equally this time around with Ulf, Tiana, Orson and Dr. Fielding all sharing equal page time. Once the Baron reveals himself the pace is very quick and the exciting adventure turns into a wild race to the end. The only thing we missed was since the whole book took place away from Farraway Hall, our favourite character, Druce the gargoyle, only made a cameo appearance at the beginning and the end.

Lots of laughs were had by both of us and we are sad to have come to the last book in print to date. My son says he'd like to start from the beginning and read them all over again so maybe I'll pass them on Dad, for bedtime reading. After doing a bit of research I see book 5 "Battle of the Zombies" will be released in June of this year (2010) in the UK, so according to the schedule that's been established so far, I think we can expect it out here in North America in December. We will anxiously be waiting!