Most of the time I acquire Halloween books from friends, they send me everything from adult reading material to children’s board books - if it has anything to do with Halloween, vampires, bats or hauntings - to them it’s fair game. “The Ink Drinker” was one that I came across when I was looking for a book called “The Ink Thinker” it was fact based book about a man that wanted to tattoo his entire body with the words of a book. Needless to say, when I did the search for the title and came across this one, I liked the brief description of it and ordered it without doing any more research on it. Once I received it and read it, I fell in love with the idea and concept behind it. One never thinks of what might happen to a vampire if he suddenly developed an allergic reaction to blood. The story was originally written in French by Eric Sanvoison and translated for this version by Georges Moroz. The illustrations that appeared in the original version are the ones that you see in this one, done up nicely by Martin Matje.

The Ink Drinker

One of the most peculiar things about this book is that no names are ever given; you never learn the name of the boy or his father, the vampire or even the bookstore where the story starts out. I read though this in about ten minutes and found myself going back through it several times to try and see if I missed a name. My French isn’t as good as it used to be so trying to make heads or tails of the words that appear in the drawings left me drawing even more blanks. The story is very cute and is the perfect pick for kids who aren’t into reading. They might find a common bond with the child in the story who hates books so much so that when he sees someone stealing them from his fathers bookstore, he doesn’t say a word. He has a little hiding spot in the back of the store, with school out he helps around the shop but his father doesn’t really trust him with books since he is a little rough with them.

Things all chance one day when a mysterious stranger walks in. He’s pale, looks rather strange and looks as if he was floating above the ground. He wandered around the aisles looking for just the right book; when he found one he didn’t open it to read it, he pressed the pages apart a little, slid in a straw and started drinking it!. The boy was thoroughly confused. How can you drink a book? He had to investigate it to make sure he wasn’t seeing things or having a daydream. When he picked up the book it felt incredibly light - almost as if it was as light as a feather. When he opened it and saw that almost every single word was sucked off the pages, he didn’t think twice, he ran out the door to track down this ink drinker and get to the bottom of his very own personal mystery.

Dodging pedestrians, the boy ran down the street trying to keep pace with the man. The odd thing is that even though he was moving incredibly fast, his legs weren’t moving - some people took notice of this and moved as far away from him as possible. He tracked him to a cemetery and figured that it was useless to give up the chase now. Throwing caution to the wind, he entered and started looking once again for the man; he finally found what he was looking for. A strange looking mausoleum [in this version called a vaulted monument - some words don’t translate very well] that was shaped like an ink bottle. Even though he was gripped with fear, he continued inward. That’s when he saw a fountain pen shaped casket surrounded by tons of books. An interesting thing about the book is that even when the ink drinker sees the child in his lair, he never asks him his name - he just calls him ‘kid’.

This is when you learn the true secret of the ink drinker. He was once a vampire but after five centuries he developed an allergic reaction to it so he had to start drinking ink. This is also when the story takes a rather interesting turn. The vampire knows that the child doesn’t believe him so he says this ...“No, you don’t believe me. Never mind, like it or not, you too will develop a taste for ink! Tomorrow you will understand ...”. You sort of gather that the vampire bites him but that isn’t divulged until the last few pages of the book. The boy awakes in the bookshop thinking that he had a daydream but something is different. All of a sudden he isn’t bothered by the books - in fact, he wants nothing more than for everyone to leave so he can be alone with the books. Lucky for him ... he had a straw neatly tucked in his pocket ... and he was more than a little thirsty!

My Take

While the book is about an ink drinking vampire, it has a much bigger meaning. After the boy takes his first taste of a book and discovers how amazing it is - how vivid and lifelike everything seems - he gets hooked on it. To me this is a good analogy for kids who hate reading - maybe they just haven’t found something that interests them to read. When the boy started drinking a book about pirates it came to life inside his mind - every descriptive word took on a new meaning for him and all of a sudden he felt very lucky to be the son of a bookstore owner. If I had the power to put a copy of this book in the hands of every child I would do it - it helps to show them that books aren’t boring or something that you use to prop a door open with. Find the right book with the right contents and you can read for hours and discover a whole new world. All it takes is flipping the book open and reading the first few lines ...

The Bottom Line

Even though the idea of an ink drinking vampire seems far fetched, the story is incredibly cute and might be something that inspires a child to read other books. The boy learns a very valuable lesson from this all - books aren’t boring! The illustrations are exceptional and really add a lot to the story and the vampire isn’t all that frightening looking; in fact, he reminds me of Uncle Fester from The Addams Family. I really like the fact that the original illustrations were used; all of the words that you see in them are in French and it adds to the mystery of the book. I’d suggest this for kids between the ages of seven and nine but teachers and parents can help out the younger kids if they have a desire to read this. If you are a teacher, this would make for an excellent read for Halloween time or as a way to get kids into the thrill of opening a book and reading about an adventure.


As always, thanks for the read!

~^V^~ Freak ~^V^~

© 2005 Freak369


Other great picks for kids ...

Welcome To The Globe: The Story of Shakespeare's Theater • The Birth of The Earth • The Egyptian Cinderella • You Wouldn't Want to Be a Medieval Knight: Armor You'd Rather Not Wear • A Medieval Feast • Graphic Classics Edgar Allen Poe Edition • Weslandia • The Vampire State Building • The Mummy • The Christmas Witch: An Italian Legend •




Recommended: Yes