From School Library Journal
Grade 6–9—The Crypt-Keeper and his gruesome group return. Two stories are devoted to Glugg, who has cartoon adventures just like Jeff Kinney's Greg Heffley, except that Glugg is dead with flies buzzing around his head. It is a "dead-on" Kinney impersonation, complete with an obnoxious older brother, "Rock." The third selection, "DieLite," is a parody of
Twilight with a loser, lovesick "Dedward" and the further adventures of Thomas Donnelly. It is a moody, dramatic piece. Readers will enjoy seeing what befalls these familiar characters in these twisted tales.—
Carrie Rogers-Whitehead, Kearns Library, UT Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
This ongoing series of youth-oriented chillers is a worthy addition to the E.C. horror-comics lineage and probably has itself a hit in this parody-filled volume. Serving as bookends are two chapters of “Diary of a Stinky Dead Kid”; imagine Jeff Kinney’s wimpy hero transformed into a brain-munching zombie (“they HAD to taste better than Mom’s broccoli and Velveeta”). The first tale focuses on brother Rock’s demon incantations, and the closing vignette about an undead Guitar Zero contest features a rather staggering depth of horror-movie in-jokes (not many kids’ satire manages references to Jacques Tourneur and Lucio Fulci). Twilight parody “DieLight” uses genuinely creepy watercolors to make fun of Dedward’s incessant yearning (“I could talk for days about how beyond speech I am!”), and an original werewolf story rounds out the package. Though an early “Anne Frankenstein” joke goes too far, the GhouLunatic hosts are as riff-roaring as ever. Fans of MAD magazine will eat this alive. Grades 5-8. --Daniel Kraus