Secrets of Dripping Fang, Book Two: Treachery and Betrayal at Jolly Days
Grade 4-6–Ten-year-old twins Wally and Cheyenne are on the run again. In the first book, they were placed in the horrid Jolly Days Orphanage after their father died in a mysterious porta-potty accident. There they ate horrid gruel and did nasty chores (bodily fluid humor is big in this series) until they were adopted by two giant ants. The twins escaped and went back to Jolly Days. In this second volume, the Onts come back looking for them, so the Shluffmuffin siblings hit the road and hide out in the scummy Dripping Fang Forest. This series has shaped up to be Lemony Snicket carried a few steps further, to the point where–to most adults–it becomes disgusting and tragic, especially when the twins learn who the decaying zombie following them might be (hint: think porta-potty). Strictly for fans of hardcore middle-grade horror.–Walter Minkel, New York Public LibraryCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.