The Vampire’s Assistant and Other Tales From the Cirque Du Freak (includes A Living Nightmare, The Vampire’s Assistant, and Tunnels of Blood)
Media Tie-In Edition
By Darren Shan
Series: Books One, Two, and Three of Cirque Du Freak: The Saga of Darren Shan

Warning: Review contains minor spoilers

It all begins when Darren and his friends find a flyer advertising the Cirque Du Freak, a traveling freak show, and decide to go. However, the four friends can only get two tickets to a show. As if by destiny, Darren “wins” one of the tickets and goes to the show with his best friend, Steve. At the show, Steve recognizes one of the performers, Mr. Crepsley, from one of his vampire books and encounters him after the show wishing to become a vampire also. Mr. Crepsley is against turning a child but would make Steve into a half-vampire if he becomes his assistant but Steve has bad blood and Crepsley refuses the turning. The following school day, after discussing the show with the friends that couldn’t go, Darren decides to steal Mr. Crepsley’s performing, though extremely poisonous, spider due to his fascination with spiders. When the spider bites and paralyzes Steve with no known antidote without Crepsley’s help, Darren becomes Mr. Crepsley’s assistant and a half-vampire in order to save Steve. Darren later leaves his family by faking his death and joins Mr. Crepsley to learn the ways of being a vampire, or rather, a half-vampire, particularly the importance of taking human blood, though not too much to kill the human the vampire is feeding from but Darren refuses to drink from a human, drinking from animals instead though animal blood is not enough – Darren will have to drink from a human eventually or die. They rejoin the Cirque Du Freak where Darren befriends Evra, the snake-boy, and meets Sam, a boy from the city in which the Cirque is currently performing, who becomes quick friends with Evra and Darren. When tragedy strikes one night after a performance, Darren finds himself in a position that may cause him to drink from a human for the first time. A few months later an old friend of Crepsley’s drops by and later Darren and Evra leave the Cirque with Crepsley though he won’t tell them where or why. They stay in a big city were Crepsley goes out prowling at night. When Darren and Evra see a news report about bodies being found drained of blood they jump to a conclusion and suspect Crepsley is the murderer, though an unknown enemy of the vampires may be lurking in the tunnels under the city…. Fans of vampire stories would enjoy this collection of the first three books of the twelve book Cirque Du Freak series though the writing style, geared towards a middle school audience, may turn some older readers away. Readers that can get passed the sometimes “wooden” dialogue and actions will find some creepy and, at times, moving scenes throughout the book.

A Living Nightmare, The Vampire’s Assistant, and Tunnels of Blood are also available individually.