THE SECRET SCIENCE ALLIANCE AND THE COPYCAT CROOK

Julian Calendar has a plan to avoid being a friendless nerd at his new school: Play dumb and pretend to love sports. Two weeks later, he’s not been labeled a nerd, but he still has no friends. Then an encrypted invitation arrives. Julian is surprised to find supposed trouble-maker Greta and superjock Ben waiting to invite him to join their inventor’s club, and the Secret Science Alliance is born. The three happily invent in their secret underground clubhouse until they incur the disdain of stodgy, mean, local inventor Dr. Stringer. When their idea book vanishes, there’s only one suspect. In getting the book back, the SSA uncovers an even more dastardly plot. With its frenetically eye-catching, full-color panels chock-full of humorous and informative detail, Davis’s first (of many, one hopes) graphic adventure of the SSA pumps new life into the kids’-secret-society formula. With its bounty of factlets slipped in for learning on the sly, it’s a sure kid and teacher pleaser—a perfect package for tweens. (Graphic fiction. 8-12)