Set in Mumphis, a lost city in the Egyptian desert that offers endless opportunities for trouble and mishaps, Animal mummies is about brilliant and clever 12-year-old Bab Sharkey who is taken to Mumphis after he befriends a pair of weird mummified animals magically brought to life (a tattered dead ibis and a bony fish, who smell pretty bad until you get used to it).

When Bab first meets the Animal Mummies, they’ve just found their long lost magical artefact, the Pharaoh’s Beard. To their amazement, the Beard fuses itself to Bab’s chin, ‘choosing’ him as the Animal Mummies’ new Pharaoh on account of his great cleverness. Wearing the Beard allows Bab to visit Mumphis, the magical city of the Animal Mummies which is otherwise invisible to humans. Plus the Beard’s pretty cool and can turn into different shapes on Bab’s command. You want a wheelbarrow-shaped Beard? You got it, Mr Pharaoh. But it isn’t all beardy good times in Mumphis.

The previous owner of the Pharaoh’s Beard was the Unpharaoh, a ruthless queen. Nowadays she’s fortunately dead, and therefore trapped in the Afterworld. But her scheming servant, Cainus the Jackal, manages to steal the Beard from Bab and the Animal Mummies after dressing up in a slightly embarrassing disguise. Cainus uses the Beard to mix a magic frappe that resurrects the Unpharaoh, who returns from the Afterworld and seizes control of Mumphis once more.

Bab and his new Animal Mummy friends must use their unique skills (and overcome their general lack of coordination) to defeat Cainus and banish the Unpharaoh back to the Afterworld.

Can they do it?