Bugging Out (Monsters Unleashed #2)

Kloepfer, John. Bugging Out (Monsters Unleashed #2)
April 24th 2018 by HarperCollins
ARC provided by Young Adult Books Central

After Manny and Freddy's adventures with the 3-D printer in Monsters Unleashed, they are glad things have calmed down. When Trevor, a new student who seems obsessed with bugs, asks Freddy to draw him a bug, he does so without thinking too much about it, but later realizes that Trevor has gotten hold of the printer, which the kids had hidden in their old school which had been destroyed by monsters. Trevor has printed out bugs, but they have started to multiply on their own, and soon there is a huge infestation. Manny and Freddie have to bring out some of the monsters to help deal with this creepy crawly invasion of "entomons", and save their community from certain doom yet again.

Even though one of the monsters has turned the 3-D printer to stone, I doubt that we have heard the end of Manny's and Freddy's adventures! Kloepfer excels at writing action scenes-- chases, explosions, bug guts splattering, you name it! These books are short and move quickly, and will be very appealing to readers who enjoy Kloepfer's Zombie Chasers series as well as Lubar's Monsterific Tales.

While this is not a notebook novel, there are a fair number of illustrations, which help to show what the bugs look like, which is very helpful. Of course, the pictures of Kraydon, Oddo, Yapzilla,  Mega-Q and Mungo are fun to see as well,

The children all work together well despite their differences, and the new character of Trevor adds a bit of depth; it's hard to tell at first if Trevor is purely evil or just misguided, and we only find out as much as our protagonists do.

Goofy monsters, swarming bugs, gummy worms, and grandmas who are around to offer snacks at the end of an epic battle-- what more could you want in a middle grade speculative fiction novel?

Not quite as popular as Zombie Chasers in my library, but definitely worth ordering.