Let's get the week motoring with a couple of biketastic drawings by a fan called Evy! I think most of you will easily be able to identify the characters in the first drawing -- Mr Crepsley is behind the wheel, while Darren is riding in the sidecar.

The second drawing might prove more of a headscratcher for those of you unfamiliar with the Extras part of my website, because it features Gavner Purl and the true love of his life... Liz Carr.

Liz was never mentioned in the books, but she appeared in a short story that I wrote to tie in with Book 5, Trials Of Death. It appears on my website, in the aforementioned Extras section, along with quite a few other short stories and articles that I wrote back when the Cirque Du Freak books were first released. Not all of them are intended to be taken as canon, but An Affair of the Night certainly is, and casts light on two things that might still be puzzling readers of the Vampire Mountain trilogy all these years later -- why was Gavner wearing yellow boxer shorts decorated with tiny pink elephants? And who exactly were his final words directed towards?

Click on the following link to read the story, but be warned -- you might want to keep a handkerchief close to hand, as it's a bit of a tearjerker...

https://darrenshan.com/extras/feature/short-stories-an-affair-of-the-night-book-5-tie-in-story