I've featured quite a few sketches by a fan called ZERO over the last couple of months. Here are four more.

The first dates back to The Vampire's Assistant, book 2 of my Saga Of Darren Shan / Cirque Du Freak series, and features RV in what is probably me at my most tragicomic -- I can be so nasty to my characters sometimes!!! (OK -- a LOT of the time!!!!)

The second pic relates to the same book, and sees Darren and Evra travelling on to a new destination, a jar of pickled onions poignantly perched between them. (See? So, so nasty to those poor characters!!!!)

The third harks back to Tunnels Of Blood, the third book in the series, and sees Mr Crepsley and Darren searching in the titular tunnels for a missing friend.

The fourth drawing is based on an infamous scene in Ocean Of Blood, the second book in my Saga Of Larten Crepsley series. I don't want to say too much, as I don't want to spoil it for those who haven't read the book, but I will note that the title of this drawing is "They used to call me Quicksilver..." and I'm sure that will send a shiver down the spine of everyone who HAS read the book!!

This scene was actually what spurred me to write the prequel series. I'd been playing around for some time with the idea of writing a few books about Mr Crepsley's life before he met Darren and Steve, but I wasn't feeling overly drawn to the project, and probably wouldn't have pressed ahead with it. Then, while watching a poor TV version of the great Dracula book, I tut-tutted when they made a mess of the great scene which is set on a boat, when Dracula is travelling across the sea to England. But as poorly as it was handled, it set me thinking about that scene in the book, and I then found myself thinking how cool it would be if Mr Crepsley had endured his own rocky boat ride at some point -- and suddenly the scene was THERE inside my head. I wasn't sure how he ended up on the boat, or exactly what would happen afterwards, but I saw very clearly what would happen to him while at sea. It was such a powerful scene, I knew that I HAD to write it -- but in order to do that, I'd have to write the rest of the series too, and figure out where it would fit within it. And so I trained my focus, started pulling the various strings together, and the rest... the rest is very BLOODY history!!!