If you've ever wondered about where the tastiest of foods—a.k.a. cheese—comes from, then you're in luck: Here Be Monsters! answers that question in no uncertain terms. Cheeses run wild in the woods surrounding the town of Ratbridge, and men on horseback capture them and lead them to captivity, where they can be shepherded and then eaten.

The cheese hunt is only the tip of the iceberg, though. We follow along as Arthur, a boy who grew up underground, makes friends with an unlikely bunch of monsters, humans, and pirates, banding together to try to foil the villainous Snatcher's evil plot, which involves resizing monsters, fooling fashionistas, and… you guessed it… hunting cheeses.

If this all sounds bizarre, well, it kind of is. But, come on—monsters, pirates, cheeses running wild? Totally entertaining. And because author Alan Snow is an accomplished illustrator, too, we get over five hundred drawings to accompany the story. And that, friends, is just gravy, since we didn't all pop out of the womb knowing what monsters like boxtrolls or cabbageheads look like.

First published in Britain back in 2005, this book made its way to the United States a couple years later. And when it did, it captured the hearts and imaginations of the folks who made the movie Coraline, so hunker down, get caught up on Arthur's adventures in Ratbridge, and then prepare to enter the debate about whether the book is better than the movie. If that doesn't pique your interest, though, we'll leave you with one thought: cheese.

This is a book about monsters, you say? What do we even mean by monster these days anyway? Are we talking Frankenstein's monster, Dexter, aliens, vampires, or what?

In Here Be Monsters! we see some critters that are, technically, considered monsters because they're not human—boxtrolls, cabbageheads, and so on. But most of them are pretty considerate and nice, so that makes us wonder: Should we keep calling them monsters? Have they really earned the title?

By way of contrast, consider the way the human villains behave: They lie, swindle, cheat, bully, and betray their fellow humans, and do even worse to non-humans. These dudes seem to have no sense of ethics—they even turn on each other—which again calls into question who, exactly, deserves to be categorized as a monster. Are we talking about the adorably awkward underlings, or the grotesquely cruel human villains?

If you're paying attention in Here Be Monsters! you'll see that monster is applied to a class of creature, not as a judgment of behavior. You may want to think a bit about whether you agree with that characterization, though. Can you tell who is a monster just by looking at them? After all, lots of ordinary-looking people end up in jail for committing monstrous acts. We spend our lives surrounded by people who look remarkably normal on the outside, but who knows what they're really capable of? It's worth thinking about, kiddos, and this book invites us to do just that.