My Auntie Chook The Vampire Chicken

By Jackie French and Stephen Michael King

We’ve all got wacky families, it’s just that some are wackier than others – find out just how wacky some families can be in the sixth book of this hilarious series.
We've all got wacky families, it's just that some are wackier than others - find out just how wacky some families can be in the sixth book of this hilarious series. Drackie is no ordinary kid. He lives on Vampire Island, where every night is dark and stormy. Soon he'll be old enough to turn into a bat and live in his own castle. Drackie has just had the best birthday ever. His parents have given him what he's always secretly wished for - a toad. And not just any toad, a vampire toad, he's called Fang. then the unthinkable happens, Fang is toad-napped and a ransom of $100,000 is asked for by the International Society of toad thieves. the only clue is a bright pink feather. A clue that leads to Auntie Chook. But who is Auntie Chook? And why doesn't anyone in Drackie's family wish to talk about her?

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Australia
• Release date: Nov 1, 2010
• ISBN: 9780730444435

Jackie French

Jackie French AM is an award-winning writer, wombat negotiator, the 2014–2015 Australian Children's Laureate and the 2015 Senior Australian of the Year. In 2016 Jackie became a Member of the Order of Australia for her contribution to children's literature and her advocacy for youth literacy. She is regarded as one of Australia's most popular children's authors and writes across all genres — from picture books, history, fantasy, ecology and sci-fi to her much loved historical fiction for a variety of age groups. ‘A book can change a child's life. A book can change the world' was the primary philosophy behind Jackie's two-year term as Laureate. jackiefrench.com facebook.com/authorjackiefrench

Book preview

Chapter 1

A Vampire’s Happy Birthday

It was a dark and stormy night. Every night was dark and stormy on Vampire Island, which meant that no one ever had to bother listening to the weather forecast. Thunder growled and lightning flashed around the castle.

‘Blood! Blood! I must have blood!’ cried Mum.

Drackie opened the fridge door. ‘What sort? There’s cow’s blood and guinea pig blood…’

Drackie picked up a bottle and sniffed it. ‘There’s some crocodile blood too, but I think it’s gone off. It’s got green furry stuff floating in it.’

‘Keep it for your Auntie Warts,’ said Mum. ‘She loves green furry stuff. The cow’s blood will do.’

Drackie watched as Mum dripped the blood into the bowl of icing sugar and began to mix it. ‘This is going to be the best birthday cake in the world!’ he said.

Mum sighed sentimentally as she spread the icing over the cake. ‘My little vampire is growing up. You’ll be old enough to turn into a bat soon and before your father and I know it you’ll be flying off to a castle of your own.’

‘Yeah, yeah, Mum,’ said Drackie. ‘Dad told me all about how boys start getting hairy and feeling these urges and how it’s all just part of the normal process of turning into a bat etcetera etcetera. Hey, can I lick out the bowl?’

Mum nodded. ‘What do you think? Beetles or snail blood clots around the cake?’

‘Snail clots,’ said Drackie. ‘The beetles will run away before everyone gets here.’

‘Not if we put them on now,’ said Mum. ‘Their feet will get stuck in the icing…Hey, what was that noise? People aren’t arriving already are they?’

Drackie peered out of the castle window. Flaming torches lined the dark driveway leading up to the moat. ‘There’s Auntie Warts flying up the drive. And there’s Cousin Snot and Uncle Blob…’

‘I haven’t even got my best cloak on yet!’ Mum wailed, lifting up her arms. ‘I’d better change.’

PVART!

A small bat fluttered above the kitchen table. ‘I wish we vampires made a softer noise when we changed,’ sighed Mum. ‘PVART! always sounds so rude! Go give Plop a hand will you Drackie, darling?’ piped the bat as it flew out the kitchen door. ‘He left it on top of the fridge.’

‘Sure, Mum,’ said Drackie. He wished he was old enough to turn into a bat too. Soon, he hoped! He picked up Plop’s hand by one finger. It was green and grey and flaky and oozing a bit from the wrist.

‘Plop!’ yelled Drackie.

‘Yes, Master!’ Plop lumbered into the kitchen.

‘Mum said I had to give you a hand,’ said Drackie, trying to ignore Plop’s smell. Plop was the best butler in the world, even if he was a zombie. But he was also six hundred years old, and as Plop said, after six hundred years you did stink a bit, even if you spent your spare time in the fridge.

‘Thank you, Master!’ said Plop. ‘Me sew it on again after the party.’ He smiled, showing his brown crumbly teeth. ‘And many happy returns, Master!’ he added. ‘What does Master want for his birthday?’

‘Don’t care,’ lied Drackie, crossing his fingers behind his back.

It wasn’t true. There was one present Drackie wanted more than anything in the world. More than a new wart album, or a red velvet cloak, or even a new coffin with a DVD-player in the lid.

But there was no way, he thought, that he was going to get it…

The front door bell rang.

The party had begun!

Chapter 2

The Best Present in the World

It was the best dark and stormy night Drackie had ever known.

‘It’s a wonderful party,’ yelled Cousin Snot over the roar of the thunder and the chatter of the entire vampire clan.

Drackie grinned at her. Cousin Snot was three weeks younger than him. She had the longest fangs and the blackest hair and fingernails of any kid on Vampire Island. ‘Plop spent three whole days arranging the spiders’ webs and sprinkling dust on the carpet,’ he told her.

‘Cool!’ said Cousin Snot. ‘Hey, have you started changing into a bat yet?’

‘Not yet,’ said Drackie. ‘I can’t wait.’

‘Me too,’ said Cousin Snot. ‘Hey, how about we try to do it now?’

‘How?’ asked Drackie cautiously. You had to be careful with Cousin Snot’s ideas.

‘Easy! We just jump from the castle balcony! Then we have to change into bats or go splat down below!’

‘Um, maybe later,’ said Drackie, crossing his fingers behind his cloak. ‘Here, have a chocolate blood clot! They’re crunchy!’

‘Thanks. By the way, happy birthday!’

‘Many happy returns from me too.’ A red-headed bat flew down next to Drackie and Cousin Snot.

PVART!

Drackie looked round automatically to see who’d farted, then realised it was just the bat changing into Auntie Warts. ‘What do you want for your birthday?’

‘Oh, nothing special,’ said Drackie, crossing his fingers behind his back again.

‘We didn’t have birthday parties when I was a boy.’ A small grey bat hovered next to them.

PVART!

It was definitely a ruder PVART! than Auntie Warts’s! The small grey bat suddenly changed into Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great Uncle Spung. His false fangs were long and yellow and his three strands of grey hair hung down to his waist.

‘When I was a boy we just grabbed a few farm girls on our birthdays and vampirised them,’ complained Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great Uncle Spung, ‘Then we…’

‘Times have changed, Great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great Uncle,’ interrupted Auntie Warts firmly. ‘No one goes around vampirising farm girls now! People just don’t like it. We vampires live by ourselves on Vampire Island and we get our blood from the supermarket.

Reviews for My Auntie Chook The Vampire Chicken

[elizajane_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The 7th book in the Wacky Family series is the third which I've read and my favourite so far. These books can be read in any order as they have no common plots or characters, just a theme of *strange* families. This time we meet a vampire family and learn how and where vampires are living today. A boy/girl cousin duo take to an adventure and find out more about the world at large when the boy's pet vampire frog is kidnapped. They meet the black sheep of the family, Auntie Chook, for the first time and all three of them end up foiling the plot of evil robots to annihilate the entire vampire race. A way over the top plot, with the requisite toilet humour of this series, but I found the three main characters endearing and couldn't help but giggling through this wacky story. For the type of silly story that it is, kids will have a hoot with this one.