Just So Stories

Walker Books

Book 5 of An Eerie-on-Sea Mystery Series

September 2023

ISBN13: 9781529502138

Australia RRP: $17.99

New Zealand RRP: $19.99

When you’ve loved every minute of a series, it’s hard to say goodbye to it. So it is that in reading this fifth and final in the wonderful Eerie-on-Sea sequence, I tried hard to make it last. But – alas! – like the others, I gobbled it up with absolute delight.

It’s not just the puns and wordplay that make me love these books, but Taylor’s wonderful sense of timing and tension, and his absolutely splendid characterisations. Herbert and Violet find themselves again embroiled with Eerie mystery and history, when the team from a paranormal podcast arrive, determined to track down the legendary malamander.

It’s not just their pushy antics, nor the usual mid-winter unpleasantness, that is unsettling Herbert. He’s beset by nightmares, and there’s a strange and dangerous ‘hum’ resounding throughout the entire town. It seems to be coming from deep underneath the ground, but it permeates everywhere and is causing mayhem. It almost causes Lady Kraken a dreadful calamity, Erwin has lost his voice – in fact, can’t even purr, the Mermonkey has an awful accident, and the dastardly Sebastian Eels is definitely up to something – which, of course, could be the root of all the trouble. 

Eel’s history, as well as that of odious Mr Mollusc, the disappearance of a sister, cheating to victory in a sailing race, a lonely lighthouse, and another long-hidden monster, the Mermedusa, combine to make this one super-suspenseful action-packed fantasy/adventure. 

This series has been one fantastical escapade after another, with the main protagonists – Herbie and Violet – children bereft of parents, but not friends, proving their resourcefulness, courage, compassion and ingenuity time and time again. Every minute of this ride has been a joy. And while it is definitely sad to say goodbye to this wonderful cast of characters, I certainly hope that Thomas Taylor has something new bubbling away on his creative stovetop.

Highly recommended for your adept readers from around Year 4 upwards, and a great series to booktalk at the start of the new school year.