The third book in the Leo’s Map of Monsters series, this time a festival, a secret exposed, and new monsters!

OMG, I was so excited when I saw the newest book over one of my libraries! I really enjoy this series (well, except for Starla). I was curious about the monster (the one we see on the cover) and also what else we would get! EEP!

In this book it is festival time and I was eager to be part of the festival along with Leo (who still is strangely called Liam in Dutch), but we all know that being a watcher is a job that requires someone to be on stand-by for all day. And yep. Leo is called to help out! There is something lurking in the forest, something big, and it is up to Leo to fix it. I was curious to see what kind of critter it was going to be, and if Leo would be able to get it in the jar (yes, don’t ask). But what happens next is even more OMG, because Leo’s best friend is suddenly there as well. Yep. You can imagine that it throws off Leo, because the secret has to be safe! I was a bit on the fence if I liked this whole thing or not. On the one hand, it was finally time because dang how did Leo keep it for that long without anyone following him? But on the other hand, was it really necessary to be the best friend? Or that it really had to come out?

Oh well, I am happy with how things went eventually, because Leo now has to find a special ingredient for his master to make a potion so that person will forget all about what he has seen. And heard. Because they don’t want the whole town finding out that monsters are real. You don’t want chaos. And I loved that this meant some more questions, because those ruins really show us something and I would love to get more deets on that. Plus, the monster, the Frightmare, was just so cool and at times quite scary. I mean, a blue horse that breathes fire and will burn you if you get close? Oh yes! And guess what, Leo has to get some hairs from that one. Which reminded me of that episode of Gravity Falls. XD Things got really excited and I loved that Starla and Leo worked together and that Leo had some great ideas.

Starla, we all know that she is NOT my favourite character and heavily reminds me of one of the annoying things on Earth, namely… Navi. LEO WALKER LEO WALKER. LORD, girl, just shut up. But in this one she did get a bit less annoying. Not by a whole lot, but she was a bit more tolerable in this one. There is still a lot of improvement to have though.

However in Dutch the monster was called both Gruwschimmel and Spookpaard. At one point I thought it was two different creatures, until my head finally realised that, oh yes, schimmel is another word for horse/it is a kind of horse. XD I would have preferred the Dutch translation to just keep it to one word to just make it a bit more clear.

The ending made me smile and I am definitely curious what other things Leo’s master can do!

All in all, I did have a lot of fun reading this one. I loved the storylines, love the monsters, but I do hope that Leo’s master gets a bit nicer, and understand that Leo is really doing his best.