The Blurb On The Back:

Meet Amelia Fang

A sparky little vampire in a dark and gloomy world … 

Amelia and her friends must venture beyond Nocturnia to the Kingdom of the Light, to rescue Queen Fairyweather.

But with terrifying angel-kittens and unicorns lurking behind every rainbow, who can they trust?  And will they uncover the true villain plotting to take over their world? 

You can order AMELIA FANG AND THE UNICORN LORDS by Laura Ellen Anderson from Amazon USA, Amazon UK, Waterstone’s or Bookshop.org UK.  I earn commission on any purchases made through these links.

The Review (Cut For Spoilers):

It’s shortly after AMELIA FANG AND THE BARBARIC BALL.  Amelia and her friends Florence, Grimaldi and Tangine (and Squashy, Amelia’s beloved pet pumpkin) are joining Tangine’s father, King Vladimir in a journey to the neighbouring Kingdom of Light in a search for Queen Fairyweather (Tangine’s mother and Vladimir’s wife).  Disguising themselves to fit in with the Kingdom of Light’s residents of fairies, angel-kittens, leprechauns and unicorns, it isn’t long until their mission starts to go wrong and they find themselves alone in an unfamiliar world where Nocturnia is viewed as an evil place responsible for the mysterious disappearances of a number of the Kingdom of Light’s residents and safety can only be guaranteed in the city of Glitteropolis ruled by the Unicorn Lords …

The second in Laura Ellen Anderson’s self-illustrated gothic fantasy series for children aged 7+ is a charming delight filled with some great humour, interesting characters (albeit I think the cast is slightly too big), great drawings and a fun story that follows on from the first book and sets the scene for the third, which I would want to check out.

I haven’t read AMELIA FANG AND THE BARBARIC BALL and to be honest, I think you need to in order to follow this book, even though Anderson does a good job of setting out the main background.  The main cast of characters are a lot of fun (my favourites being Florence and Grimaldi) and Amelia makes for a determined main character who’s devoted to her pumpkin (who I loved).  However, given the number of Amelia’s friends here and the shortness of the book there isn’t much chance for them all to shine, which I thought was a shame given they all have so much potential.

There’s a lot of fun to be had through the clash of cultures between Nocturnia and the Kingdom of Light and the villains are suitably dastardly and I liked the point Anderson makes about people offering safety and saying bad things about others for their own ends.  Anderson’s illustrations are also excellent – my favourites showing the friends in their respective disguises (with Florence as a unicorn being the one that made me laugh out loud).

Ultimately the charm and wit make this an enjoyable read and I will definitely check out the other two books in this series.

AMELIA FANG AND THE UNICORN LORDS was released in the United Kingdom on 8^th March 2018.  Thanks to the Amazon Vine Programme for the review copy of this book.