By Nina Schuyler, The Children’s Book Review
Published: July 9, 2013
Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain, #9
Age Range: 7 – 10 years
Paperback: 96 pages
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers (April 23, 2013)
Big kudos to anyone who makes the common cooking utensil heroic.
Lunch Lady is back, with Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain, #9, by Jarrett J. Krosoczka. Someone is stealing all the high tech gadgets at Thompson Brook School. Gone are Lunch Lady’s Spork Phone, a kid’s pocket poker game, electric guitars, projectors, laptops and Hector’s X-Station mobile—and he’d been winning the latest game of Mega Mash Brothers! In this newest Lunch Lady, Hector is running for new student council president. What better platform than to promise a safe school—safe from thieves!
Lunch Lady starts investigating. She places a smartphone by the water cooler. As soon as the thief picks it up, it will snap a photo and send it to Lunch Lady’s laptop. As Lunch Lady tracks down the thief, Hector is giving his speech in front of the school. There’s not as many nifty cooking utensils in this one, but it’s still full of action and mystery. My ten-year-old son’s complaint? “It wasn’t long enough. I wish there were about 100 more pages.”
Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain sets up several unresolved mysteries, such as a Cyborg who is working at A1 copy and a mean superintendent, who comes in and closes down the cafeteria, assuring readers that there will soon be #10.
Add this book to your collection: Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain, #9
About the Reviewer
Nina Schulyer‘s first novel, The Painting, was nominated for the Northern California Book Award and was named a ‘Best Book’ by the San Francisco Chronicle. Her new novel, The Translator, published by Pegasus Books, released in July, 2013. She is the fiction editor for www.ablemuse.com and teaches creative writing at the University of San Francisco. For more information, visit: www.ninaschuyler.com.
