It’s hard blending in when you’re different, but for Gene, standing out means death. He’s unique because of how he acts: when he finds something humorous, he wants to laugh instead of scratch his wrists like the People do; he can’t see in the dark like they can; and when he sleeps, he doesn’t stand on the ceiling. Gene’s dark secret is that he’s a heper (to us, a regular human) in a world full of monstrous vampires whose one insatiable craving is to eat his kind.

Gene has managed to maintain the facade well enough, even blending in at school. But when he is randomly picked to participate in a heper hunt, Gene knows it’s going to take all his skills just to survive.

Andrew Fukuda has managed to do the impossible in The Hunt – he’s made vampires scary again. These bloodsuckers don’t sparkle, they’ll hunt you down in a heartbeat thanks to their speed and insatiable bloodlust. The strangeness of their unconscious actions, like their lack of facial emotions and the wrist scratching for laughter is quite unsettling, and the fear you feel for the lone human survivor is almost claustrophobic at times.

It’s inevitable that this book, like many others before it, will be compared to The Hunger Games because of its edge-of-your-seat action, but unlike the others, The Hunt deserves the comparison. Readers looking for something to get the blood pumping shouldn’t pass up The Hunt.

[[hollyharperpicture]] Holly Harper is a children’s bookseller at Readings Carlton where she organises the kids and Young Adult enews’. She also writes books for younger readers under the name H.J. Harper. Find out more about her