Eighth Grade Bites

Eighth Grade Bites is a novel by Z Brewer, published in 2007 and the first of the stories about Vladimir Tod. Vlad is thirteen, and the trouble he is in at school is the ordinary kind: bullies, a principal who watches him and a girl he likes who prefers his best friend.

He also has a secret. His mother was human and his father was a vampire, which makes Vlad something in between, and he has been left without anyone to explain how much of either half he inherited. He deals with blood cravings and enlarged fangs every day while trying to keep anyone from noticing them. He does not know how much of his father's nature he has, or what it will do to him as he grows.

Then a substitute teacher begins to question him a little too closely, and Vlad has to worry that his cover is about to fail. He is also being hunted, because a vampire killer is looking for him. The book follows a boy who has been trying to pass as ordinary while somebody hunts him for what he actually is.