There’s nothing subtle about Darren Shan’s Ocean of Blood (HarperCollins, £12.99). Gangs of vampire cubs roam the land, scavenging off battlefields, gorging on sticky corpses. When Larten tires of his wayward ways, he tries the high way of the clan elders, before breaking off once again to go it alone in the icy wastes of Greenland. Not much fodder for a vampire there, you’d think, but this is only book two in The Saga of Larten Crepsley, so perhaps there’s blood in them thar glaciers.