Marvelous Middle Grade Monday
Press 1 for Invasion (Aladdin, 2025) by J.A. Dauber is hilarious and deliciously scary. The first line is great: “It’s all my parents’ fault.”
Precocious 10-year-old Matt’s parents won’t let him have a cell phone like the other kids, so, of course, when he sees a cell phone on the sidewalk, he picks it up and keeps it. But it won’t make calls and the only app he can use is the camera. But when Matt takes a picture of Mr. Mackintosh, the school crossing guard, it shows a purple alien with scary teeth, six or seven eye stalks, and tentacles. But Matt’s the only one who can see it. Then the lunch lady, Mrs. MacGillicuddy, reveals that there’s an alien invasion and only he can help save everyone in the world from being eaten.
Matt is definitely funny–the way he thinks and talks–yet he also finds out he hasn’t been a great friend. But the threat of being cooked in an oven changes one’s perspective.
Read about the author here. He’s also written a YA novel, Mayhem and Madness: Chronicles of a Teenaged Supervillain.
The Mostly True Story of Jack (Little, Brown, 2011) by Kelly Barnhill is told in multiple viewpoints. It’s good. It’s scary. And it has a great opening: “Frankie was the first to know. Frankie was the first to know most things–but since he hadn’t spoken since he was eight years old, it didn’t matter what he knew. He couldn’t tell anyone.” How could you not read that book?!