Serwa Boateng’s Guide to Vampire Hunting (Serwa Boateng #1)
Written by Roseanne A. Brown
Published by Disney Publishing Group
Best-selling author Rick Riordan presents best-selling YA author Roseanne A. Brown’s middle grade debut about a pre-teen vampire slayer with a strong helping of Ghanaian folklore.
For most kids, catching fireflies is a fun summer activity. For twelve-year-old Serwa Boateng, it’s a matter of life and death.
That’s because Serwa knows that some fireflies are really adze, shapeshifting vampires from the forests of Southeastern Ghana. Adze prey on the blood of innocents, possessing their minds and turning them into hulking monsters, and for generations, slayers like Serwa and her parents have protected an unknowing public from their threats.
Serwa is the best adze slayer her age, and she knew how to use a crossbow before she could even ride a bike. But when an obayifo (witch) destroys her childhood home while searching for a drum, do Serwa’s parents take her with them on their quest to defeat her? No. Instead, they dump Serwa with her hippie aunt and cryptic-obsessed cousin in the middle of Nowheresville, Maryland “for her own safety.” Now, instead of crossbows and battle armor, she’s dealing with mean girls and algebra, and for the first time in her life she doesn’t have to carry a staff everywhere she goes, which is . . . kind of nice, actually.
Just as Serwa starts to get the hang of this whole normal girl who doesn’t punch vampires every day thing, an adze infiltrates her school. It’s up to her to whip some of her classmates into monster-fighting shape before all of them become firefly food. And when she uncovers a secret that upends everything she thought she knew about her family’s role in the slayer vs. adze war, Serwa will have to decide which side of herself–normal girl or slayer–is the right one.
Don’t miss the rest of the series. Explore:
Serwa Boateng’s Guide to Witchcraft and Mayhem (Serwa Boateng #2)
Serwa Boateng’s Guide to Saving the World (Serwa Boateng #3)
Primary ISBN: 9781368066365
Publication Date: August 2023
Available As: Hardcover, Paperback, Audiobook, eBook
Middle Grade, Age 10 or older
Community Represented: Ghanaian/Ghanaian American
Themes: Accolades & Awards: Starred Review, Coming of Age, Cross-Group Friendship, Cultural Empowerment & Joy: Family, Cultural Empowerment & Joy: Storytelling, Family Relationship: Extended, Family Relationship: Parents, Format: Audiobook, Generation: 1st, Genre: Fantasy & Folklore, Own Voices/Lived Experience, Welcoming by School
Setting: United States (Maryland)
Character's Place in the Immigration Journey: 1st Generation
Book Creator(s) Connection to the Community Represented: Own Voices/Lived Experience
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Source: Disney|Hyperion