SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Chapters Read: 7-12

These were fairly basic, straightforward, but still very solid chapters. Darren is getting to live a normal enough, wholesome life for a time as he spends more time with Debbie. I'm happy for him, I'm glad he gets to make happy memories in an otherwise abnormal life.

As I mentioned before, it's also pretty enjoyable that it's winter and Christmas time. I don't know if weather or Christmas is brought up much at all later in the series. I guess I'll figure that out shortly! It's also mysterious how official city names and locations are kept unnamed, this aspect of the series always intrigued me. It's explained why, because Darren claims this is a true story and all that, still interesting to read about. I'm picturing this city as like a fairly big, northeast U.S. city, just because I feel like it LOL. I guess that's an added benefit of keeping city names out of it, it allows you to picture things yourself.

Even though locations are left anonymous, it's funny how they straight up mention the TV show The Simpsons. It is nice to have a relevant piece of culture be referenced.

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As things are seemingly cheerful and nice, circumstances get spooky again quickly. While Darren and Evra are having a great time, Mr. Crepsley continues to be enigmatic. He goes on these missions throughout the night, and is consistently distracted when speaking with the boys.

Evra discovers some wild news on the television, regarding some vicious murders in the city and the boys immediately suspect Mr. Crepsley. Well, Evra shows some hesitation to blame Mr. Crepsley immediately but Darren is practically convinced despite basically zero evidence.

After all this time, practically a year and half after Darren was changed to a half-vampire, Darren still doesn't fully trust Mr. Crepsley and I guess I get that. Abandoning your life and family isn't something one gets over quickly. He has learned to slowly like him more, but it's clear that Darren isn't fully on the same page with him at times.

They decide to track Mr. Crepsley through the streets on foot and by using cell phones. They discover little in their investigation so far, but Mr. Crepsley is acting strange, watching people in the city, running around rooftops and in alleyways.

I find it interesting that cell phones are mentioned, mostly because these books were published in the very early 2000's and of course were written in the 90's. I'm confident in assuming that anyway LOL. City names aren't named, but some cultural and time period items are named. Fascinating.

I picture cell phones back then and it's just fun, I imagine they were fat flip phones or big Nokia type of phones. The mention of CD players and CDs is also super fun and brings back a lot of memories. Darren wants to get Evra a CD player and CDs for Christmas!🎄 Ahh, how time flies.

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Anyway, the boys are hot on Mr. Crepsley's tail, let's see what happens next, we're about to meet a serious villain. We're about halfway through!