Fear the Barfitron (Monster Juice Series #1)

by M. D. Payne, Amanda Dockery (Illustrator)

Overview

When Chris Taylor discovers that the residents of the retirement home where he volunteers are secretly monsters--and have stolen what appears to be his life essence--he leaves to recruit his friends to help him get it back. But once they return to the retirement home, the boys find themselves at the center of a vomit-inducing war against some of the grossest monsters this world has ever encountered. Will Chris and his friends join the residents to fight off the Barfitron?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780698159952
Publisher:	Penguin Young Readers Group
Publication date:	08/15/2013
Series:	Monster Juice Series , #1
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	192
Lexile:	690L (what's this?)
File size:	2 MB
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

M.D. Payne is a mad scientist who creates monsters by stitching together words instead of dead body parts. After nearly a decade in multi-media production for public radio, he entered children’s publishing as a copywriter and marketer. Monster Juice is his debut series. He lives in the tiny village of New York City with his wife and baby girl, and hopes to add a hairy, four-legged monster to his family soon.

Editorial Reviews

A blatant bid for the Goosebumps audience, with added gushes of vomit. Nerdy middle schooler Chris discovers that the old-age home at which he volunteers is populated by decrepit, bingo-loving vampires, werewolves and other monsters. As if that's not terrifying enough, the home is attacked by an army of cat-sized "sussuroblats," cockroaches with sharp teeth in drooling human mouths. The plot makes a convenient framework on which to hang tantalizing references to grease, farts, school-lunch items like "Salisbury Snake" and suchlike. They escalate into actual juicy burps, funky smells, cascades of phlegmy goo in decorator hues and encounters with the odd slimy tentacle or crunchy spider before the main attraction begins: hurling, and lots of it. As it turns out, learning that the butyric acid in vomit is death to sussuroblats, Chris and his buddies need only manage to lead them all into the local amusement park's dizzying Gravitron and have them spew all over each other to dissolve the threat. Easy peasy. Buckets full of gross, but are readers guano scoop up an entire series? Snot likely. (Gross-out horror. 10-12)

Kirkus Reviews