The Werewolf Club Meets Dorkula is the third book in the Werewolf Club series. It can be read as a standalone, but the series is best read in order. The Werewolf Club is made up of werewolves who go to Watson Elementary School. They are relaxing after saving the world in book two of the series at a barbeque in their faculty sponsor’s backyard. Billy Furball asks if they know there’s a vampire at their school. There is a discussion about whether vampires really exist. Billy Furball hasn’t seen him turn into a bat, but the vampire did bite his juice box. Mr. Talbot, their faculty sponsor, refuses to believe that vampires exist, but Henry, Count Dorkula turns up at the next Werewolf Club meeting with a box of jelly doughnuts that have had all the jelly sucked out of them. Mr. Talbot still refuses to believe that vampires exist but Billy Furball falls under Dorkula’s spell and starts calling him “Master”. After the meeting, a bat flies over the members of the Werewolf Club and Billy Furball becomes Dorkula’s slave. He is frequently seen carrying fruit to his master.

 

Suddenly there is a serious fruit shortage and suspicion falls immediately upon Billy Furball and Dorkula. Dorkula brags about being a vampire and sucking blood. Lucy tricks him by offering him a choice of her neck or a juicy pear. When he choses the pear and sucks it dry, he is forced to admit that, while he can turn into a bat, it’s a fruit. The Werewolf Club demands that he tell them what he knows about the fruit shortage. After they agree to accept him as a member of the Werewolf Club, he admits that his great-great-great-great uncle, Noshferatu, is also a fruitpire. He is the one behind the fruit shortage. They decide they have to stop him. They bring in a fruitpire hunter, Van Helsing, the fruiterer. Under Van Helsing’s leadership, they creep into Noshferatu’s crypt. Noshferatu has the classic vampire red eyes, but they look like olives with pimentos rather that channeling the flames of hell. Despite Van Helsing’s attempt to capture him by using a steak, Noshferatu escapes and steals a barge full of fruit. It looks as if the Werewolf Club and Noshferatu have lost when the barge suddenly turns around. Dorkula has gotten his great-great-great-great-uncle to agree to no more wholesale fruit theft by holding the steak to his heart. Once again, the Werewolf Club has saved the world and the book ends happily.

 

The book has black and white illustrations. Dorkula is drawn with the widow’s peak, cape and fangs of the stereotypical movie vampire. Noshferatu is a more old-fashioned vampire, bald with pale skin and he is emaciated. The book plays on all the vampire tropes. The book will not satisfy those children who demand their vampires be scary, but it is hysterically funny, and there are enough vampire elements thrown in that kids demanding scary will be content to wait for a truly scary book.

Dorkula appears in the final two books of the series, but his vampireness does not appear front and center as it does in this book.