With autumn in the air and the nights starting to draw in, it's time to put aside the sun loungers and long for spooky tales around the campfire - and who better to talk with about all things spooky than the brilliant Emma Carroll. The first in her brand new series of vampire books is out this month - Dracula and Daughters describes what happenswhen three cousins discover they’re descendants of Dracula and combine their powers to form a vampire healing company. Given that this comes from Emma, whose work was described as 'dangerous' by none other than Ted Hughes, it's going down big with Nadia and Frank. They might be full of bravado talking to Emma - but it's a shoo in that they'll both be too scared to sleep when it comes time for hitting the hammocks.

Nadia and Frank bring the island back to the fabulous Festival of Brilliant in Staffordshire where there's quizzing to be done. Frank joins his teammate - doodle-tactic Adeola Sokunbi of Destiny Ink fame - in the green room ahead of proceedings to quiz her about her own fabulous arrival in the world of children's books. Meanwhile Nadia's on the hunt for her own teammate, Christopher 'formerly of this parish' Edge, little knowing that Frank has locked him in an escape room. Fortunately Christopher has the Edge on Frank as he's a dab hand at escape rooms obvs - and is all ready to go when the first question's asked. None of this explains why Stuart Maconie is on scoring duty, but some things are best left alone.

Frank and Nadia have been busy knocking down some of the pre-fab buildings they've had delivered and hiding the plans for the cross-island superhighway they were so keen on - because the fabulous Pari Thomson, creator of the magical botanical paradise Greenwild - is heading shorewards on her lily-pad for a visit. No surprise that this series of eco-thrillers has been a massive success, they're exciting enough to even distract Frank from his one-man campaign to make poets read aloud better. No surprise either that Nadia is finally ready for some time alone.