Welcome to Smellville

September 15, 2020
Ten children chosen from a teeming crew of trading-card characters with personal-hygiene issues shamble into print. Parodying the Cabbage Patch Kids and subject since the 1980s to various expansions and reboots, the chubby-cheeked characters--all paper white in the monochrome cast list and frequent illustrations--bear suggestive names like Luke Puke, Rob Slob, and Babbling Brooke; exhibit gross and slovenly behavior; and live together in appalling filth. With all this built-in child appeal, who better to present their misadventures in prose than Stine, the creator of the redolent Rotten School series (and one or two others)? Here, Adam Bomb (his head explodes) and five other housemates trade off narrative duties in a set of short-attention-span episodes. These feature an all-booger science project, middle school hijinks (" 'Hey, check it out!' Wacky Jackie called, and held up her clay creation. 'What is that?' Mrs. Hooping-Koff asked. Jackie grinned. 'It's a body part! Guess what it is?' "), an abusive Rent-a-Mom hired to fend off the snoopy neighboring Perfects, and, for occasional diversions, repeated failures of favorite TV superhero Jonny Pantsfalldown to nab butt-crack-flashing supervillain Big Bootus. By the end, the Perfects and the Rent-a-Mom are both sent packing. "But we're not bad kids," Adam Bomb explains. "We just don't know any better." Maybe young readers will. Lots of laffs...or at least wet and dry heaves. (stickers) (Media tie-in/fiction. 7-10)

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October 2, 2020

Gr 3-5-Stine kicks off his latest collaboration with the Garbage Pail Kids at Smellville Middle School. The Kids manage to survive the pitfalls of middle school but have somehow tipped off Peter and Patty Perfect. The Perfect parents take an interest in the Garbage Pail Kids' parentless state and decide to do something about it. The Kids are challenged to come up with their own choice for parents before they are forced into the parent choice made by the bossy Perfect family. With characters like Junkfood John, Rob Slob, and Cranky Frankie, this will appeal to kids with the corniest sense of humor. While flat characters, lack of diversity, and the flippant plot will turn off many readers, fans of Dan Gutman's "My Weird School" series or Dav Pilkey's "Captain Underpants" may appreciate the zany humor. Black-and-white illustrations peppered through the narrative enhance the tale. Extras such as Brainy Janey's history quiz and superhero comics by Johnny Pantsfalldown lend a little variety to the text. VERDICT A secondary purchase if one has a large crowd of zany schoolhouse series fans.-Julie Shatterly, W. A. Bess Elem. Sch., Gastonia, NC

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