Creepella von Cacklefur: Fright Night by Geronimo Stilton, paperback chapter book, 112 pages, published by Scholastic Inc. in 2013.

Creepella von Cacklefur is a good friend of Geronimo Stilton. She lives with her family at Cacklefur Castle in Mysterious Valley, where many spooky things happen. Creepella writes books that Geronimo publishes, and Fright Night is her latest best seller.

Geronimo is in Mysterious Valley when he gets roped into being a judge for the scary poet contest known as Fright Night. Creepella’s father is one of the contestants, but during the competition he goes missing. And there is something strange about one of the other contestants too. It is up to Geronimo and Creepella to solve the mystery.

This is the fifth installment of Creepella von Cacklefur’s adventures, and like the original Geronimo Stilton books, it is full of colour illustrations and graphic text. The chapters are reasonably short and easy to read, making this a fantastic book for lower to middle primary age children. These stories are fun, and I like the funny names that the characters are given.

Despite the story revolving around a scary poet contest, this book wasn’t really scary at all. Both my preschooler and second grader thought it was funny, but I think a lot of that was because Geronimo is a scaredy mouse and kept trying to escape from the contest. There were some references to things that can be spooky, such as coffins and mummies, as is fitting for the theme of the story. This was another fun Geronimo mystery adventure told by his good friend, Creepella.