I received a free ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

A cute little story about Hilda who is different from all the other vampire bats. A cute little book.

The first page hooked me with its humor. I wanted to love this one, I truly did, and while I enjoyed it, it was not enough to make me want to buy a copy for my classroom.

Once upon a time long ago bats walked and talked and used humans as food. Hilda which is a vampire bat, however, Hilda is a vegan. Hilda only cared about being the prettiest bat in town and going to the initiation ball with Handsome Harry. The ball is for young bats that haven’t tasted human blood yet, Hilda is blissfully nieve of the truth behind the ball. Once she finds out she refuses to drink the blood. What will be the consequences of her refusal?

This is an interesting book. I believed was a children’s book, however, I feel the book would be scary for younger children. I believe even older children would have a hard time getting interested in this style of writing. I as an adult started and stopped reading the prologue several times because I had trouble getting interested. The concept is interesting, the story is humorous, and the illustrations are entertaining. The book has redeemable aspects, however, I’m not sure it’s right for the target audience.

I voluntarily agreed to read a copy of this book supplied by Netgalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own and in no way have been influenced by anyone.

Truly terrible, was so bad i couldnt finish it and had to give up. There is no flow, no narrative, its hard to read, too many verbs in sentences make it very disjointed. Needs a massive rewrite frankly.

I was attracted by the cover, which yes I know we shouldn't judge a book by, but it's very cute - that and the alliterative title,

Unfortunately it just all seemed very different an experience than I was expecting.

I wish the author much success but it just wasn't my cup of tea. The flow, word usage, the pacing of it all just felt off.

I enjoy a well written and thought out children's or YA book.
Sadly, despite the cute cover and appealing blurb, this is not one of those books.
The language is quite cumbersome, stilted, and archaic. Unfamiliar vocabulary is fine in a children's book if it can be figured out through context. That is how we learn.
As I continued trying to read the story, I was struck by how hard it was to continue.
I don't know who would find this worth reading, but I am not that person.

What do you do when you're a bat, a vegetarian bat. This is Hilda, greatly enjoying her delicious veggies. Little does she know is that during the grand ball all young bats have to drink blood! Ugh! What will Hilda do? This is a great, and fun book to read. Cleverly written!

As an adult trying to read this, I couldn't get past the first chapter so I handed it to someone of the target audience to see if she enjoyed it any more than I did or found it any less confusing...and she handed it back to me around the same point that I'd given up on it. The flow of the writing seems off and while I realize we want children to learn from reading, too many random words they don't understand or use frequently in every day language can just be a turn off.

Consider this a bit of consumer advice rather than a review – this never once got me interested in its plot, if indeed it has one. It's just that it's all in a pell-mell, never-changing, high-falutin' manner and style that both wearied me and would make any modern child reader utterly confused. Within minutes you'll see someone "in their cups", the use of the word "puff" for existence, and "rallentando", not to forget "lath" and a "desquamation". Later on the child will encounter "spiffing fangs" and "oafish maids" – what kind of fish?! I fully agree with recent reports from children's authors about how they've had to drop any sign of intelligent use of language in favour of multi-ethnic characters, just to get published, but getting such an old-fashioned style on the page with no regard to the audience, as has been done here, is some achievement. But it's not one to applaud at all.

I really wanted to love this book. The cover is simply adorable. Unfortunately, it was a very quick dnf for me.

I don't see that it could possibly be a children's book. The language is stilted and doesn't flow. Words are used that I can't imagine many children knowing, like foetid, brevity, stupendous, and hydrophobic. Who uses the word minced outside of a historical romance? The diction is extremely advanced for a children's book. I can maybe see this being a middle-grade book, but I think calling this a children's book is reaching.

I really thought the concept of this book sounded fun and interesting, however, it fell a little flat unfortunately.

First of all, the writing was really awkward. It just felt unnatural and awkward to say.

Second, this is not a good children's book. My kids were extremely bored. They stopped listening and ended up going and playing with legos WHILE I was reading it. Since story time is beloved in our home, that is not a common occurance to happen while I am reading.

Overall, it just didn't work for it. It wasn't a great story and we didn't enjoy it unfortunately.

I barely made it past the prologue, and even that was a struggle. This format and writing style might work for some people, but it really wasn't for me. It also wasn't fun to read out loud to my kid. This was supposed to be a children's book, but I have no idea how a child is supposed to read through this and understand anything.

"I had gone to bed at nine of the clock. This is early for me, but I was more than usually tired, having topped off my supper with a portion of Stilton bigger than my head. My stomach was dragging me down towards the floorboards, and it was with great difficulty that I remained upright at all. Cheesy fumes filled my brain. Sleep was knitting up my eyelashes with a greenish crust. I concluded that I must become horizontal with great haste otherwise I would surely die."

I was really excited about a vegetarian vampire bat, so I'm bummed this one didn't work out.

I would like to thank Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free copy in exchange for my honest review.

I was really looking forward to reading this with my kids ,( And also just to myself!)

Unfortunately I found the style of writing very hard to read . I tried reading it with 3 of my children , ages ranging from 9-13 but none of them could follow it and found the words used above their level of understanding .
It didn't hold their interest for more than a few mins at a time.

I did find it funny but it was struggle to finish.

I had such high hopes for this book when I read the description and saw the adorable cover. However, the book was just not for me and left me disappointed. I thought it would be a book that my niece and I could read together but it didn’t have enough to keep her attention. The pictures were few and far between, and the pictures that were in the book looked as if my niece had drew them. I really wanted to like this book but sadly it was a miss for me.

This book just isn't for me and my boys. It didn't have enough to keep their attention during a reading session. I expected it to have something to draw in younger audiences. I should have researched it more, but the cover through me off.

Such a cute read that reminded me of Neil Patrick Harris’ style of writing. The story is adorable and I didn’t want it to end.

I found this book difficult to read. Not sure if this is a style that kids will like. There are illustrations but they are very basic. Overall I don't think I'll read or buy this to my son.