The Smartest Kid in the Universe Read online

  FAVORITES FROM CHRIS GRABENSTEIN

  The Island of Dr. Libris

  Shine! (coauthored with J.J. Grabenstein)

  The Smartest Kid in the Universe

  THE MR. LEMONCELLO’S LIBRARY SERIES

  Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library

  Mr. Lemoncello’s Library Olympics

  Mr. Lemoncello’s Great Library Race

  Mr. Lemoncello’s All-Star Breakout Game

  Mr. Lemoncello and the Titanium Ticket

  THE WELCOME TO WONDERLAND SERIES

  Home Sweet Motel

  Beach Party Surf Monkey

  Sandapalooza Shake-Up

  Beach Battle Blowout

  THE HAUNTED MYSTERY SERIES

  The Crossroads

  The Demons’ Door

  The Zombie Awakening

  The Black Heart Crypt

  COAUTHORED WITH JAMES PATTERSON

  The House of Robots series

  The I Funny series

  The Jacky Ha-Ha series

  Katt vs. Dogg

  The Max Einstein series

  Pottymouth and Stoopid

  The Treasure Hunters series

  Word of Mouse

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2020 by Chris Grabenstein

  Cover art copyright © 2020 by Antoine Losty

  Title lettering copyright © 2020 Neil Swaab

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

  Random House and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Visit us on the Web! rhcbooks.com

  Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at RHTeachersLibrarians.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Grabenstein, Chris, author.

  Title: The smartest kid in the universe / Chris Grabenstein.

  Description: First edition. | New York: Random House Children’s Books, [2020]

  Summary: When seventh-grader Jake McQuade mistakes the world’s first ingestible knowledge pills for jelly beans, he suddenly knows all about physics and geometry and can speak Swahili (though Spanish would be a lot more useful)—but his sort-of girlfriend Grace thinks they can use his newfound brilliance to save their middle school from the new principal, who is conspiring to get it shut down.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019051235 | ISBN 978-0-525-64778-2 (hardcover) | ISBN 978-0-525-64779-9 (library binding) | ISBN 978-0-593-30547-8 (int’l) | ISBN 978-0-525-64780-5 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Genius—Juvenile fiction. | Conspiracies—Juvenile fiction. | Middle schools—Juvenile fiction. | Humorous stories. | CYAC: Genius—Fiction. | Conspiracies—Fiction. | Middle schools—Fiction. | Schools—Fiction. | Humorous stories. | LCGFT: Humorous fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.G7487 Sm 2020 | DDC 813.6 [Fic 23]

  Ebook ISBN 9780525647805

  Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.

  Penguin Random House LLC supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to publish books for every reader.

  ep_prh_5.6.0_c0_r0

  Contents

  Cover

  Favorites from Chris Grabenstein

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Epilogue

  Are You as Smart as the Smartest Kid in the Universe?

  Thank You To…

  About the Author

  For Dr. Craig Smith (surgeon), Dr. David Sherman (cardiologist), and all the physicians, physician assistants, nurses, and staff of the Cardiac Care Unit at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center: Thank you all for studying so hard in school.

  Eduardo Leones wasn’t the bravest pirate on Capitán Aliento de Perro’s crew.

  But he was definitely the smartest.

  Because he was the only one not on the sinking ship.

  Cannons boomed. Masts snapped. The sky was on fire.

  And Eduardo was safe in a bobbing rowboat well below the fray.

  “Yarr,” cried Aliento de Perro, leaning over the railing and working a line to lower a heavy iron chest. “Row upriver, ye scurvy knave. Find a good hiding place for me booty. Then hurry back to tell me where it be, or you’ll end up like your cowardly father!”

  “Sí, sí, Capitán,” the clever Eduardo shouted back—even though he planned to obey only the first half of that order.

  Because the treasure wasn’t the captain’s.

  Aliento de Perro had stolen it
from Eduardo’s father!

  El Perro Apestoso (the Stinky Dog), the ship that the blustering pirate Aliento de Perro (“Dog Breath”) now commanded, had been seized in an ugly mutiny from Eduardo’s father, the brave buccaneer Angel Vengador Leones. After forcing the ship’s captain to walk the plank, Aliento de Perro had kept young Eduardo alive only so he could torment the boy.

  Now the ship that had plundered and pillaged up and down the east coast of the American colonies was sinking under the relentless attack of a British man-o’-war that had chased it upriver. As a precaution, Dog Breath (who never brushed his teeth) had ordered his cabin boy to haul the ship’s treasure to a less treacherous location.

  Eduardo grinned as he lashed the heavy chest to the deck of his small vessel.

  And then he started rowing. Hard.

  North.

  The listing pirate ship turned about to block the man-o’-war’s pursuit with a broadside of cannon blasts. The British ship roared back with mast-shattering, wood-splintering, sail-searing shots of its own.

  The Stinky Dog might not be afloat when young Eduardo found a secure spot to hide his captain’s treasure.

  Which was fine by Eduardo.

  He had cleverly tricked Aliento de Perro into thinking he was too terrified to ever plot revenge. But he would avenge his father’s death.

  All that treasure would become his.

  And his children’s.

  And his children’s children’s.

  And his children’s children’s children’s.

  And his children’s children’s children’s children’s.

  If only they would prove bold and clever enough to find it.

  Patricia Malvolio, the new principal of Riverview Middle School, was giving a special, after-hours tour of her building to a very important guest: Mr. Heath Huxley.

  “This school is in terrible condition!” said Mr. Huxley.

  “I know,” giggled Mrs. Malvolio. “Isn’t it marvelous? It’s perfect for our plans.”

  The lockers were dented and rusty. Overhead, fluorescent lights sputtered in their tubes, pleading to be replaced. Paint peeled off the cinder-block walls in chunks the size of potato chips.

  “What’s that smell?” asked Mr. Huxley, covering his mouth and nose with a dainty silk handkerchief.

  Mrs. Malvolio sniffed the air.

  She was tempted to say Your breath, since Mr. Huxley’s never smelled minty or fresh.

  “Tuna fish salad?” she suggested. “Stinky cheese? Moldy pizza? It’s hard to tell. The refrigerators in the cafeteria are…unreliable.”

  Mrs. Malvolio tugged down on the canary-yellow blazer that matched her canary-yellow blouse. The tugging caused her necklace—three rows of big, multicolored beads—to clack.

  “Now, as I told you,” she said, “Riverview is currently considered the worst middle school building in the district. Given the new budget cuts, the city will be forced to close one middle school this year. I suspect it will be us.”

  She led the way into her office. Mr. Huxley went to the window to admire the view of the river.

  “This is magnificent, Patricia.”

  “I know. It’s why this school is called Riverview.”

  “And what will the city do with this marvelous property once they shut down this dilapidated excuse for a school?”

  “Oh, I suppose they might auction off the land to the highest bidder.”

  “Who will also be the smartest bidder,” said Mr. Huxley, stroking back his slick black hair. “The one who understands how truly valuable this property is.”

  “Yes, Uncle Heath,” said Mrs. Malvolio. “They’ll probably sell it to you. And then you’ll pay me that very generous finder’s fee we discussed when I applied for this principal position.”

  “Indeed I will, Patricia.”

  They both laughed maniacally.

  It ran in the family.

  Jake McQuade wasn’t the smartest kid at Riverview Middle School, but he was definitely the coolest.

  The school itself, on the other hand, was kind of shabby.

  The place hadn’t fallen apart all at once. If it had, people might’ve done something. Riverview’s decline had been slow and steady. It took time and neglect. No one ever thought to repaint the cinder-block walls. Or to replace the lockers, most of which were too bent out of shape to be locked anymore.

  “We try,” Mr. Lyons would tell Jake. “We try.”

  Mr. Charley Lyons was the school’s vice principal, a social studies teacher, and the basketball coach. He’d been at Riverview for over twenty years.

  “But the new principal?” He shook his head. “ ‘Le zumba el mango,’ as my grandfather used to say.”

  Jake never knew what Mr. Lyons was saying when, all of a sudden, he dropped a little Spanish. Jake would’ve had to learn Spanish to do that. And seventh grader Jake McQuade wasn’t big on “learning stuff.” He came to school to have a good time and hang with his friends. If he needed to actually know anything important, he could look it up on his phone.

  He stopped by the bathroom to check his look in a mirror. Black hair, blue eyes, and fair, freckled skin. It was a good look. And lately Jake wanted to look good.

  Because of Grace.

  Grace Garcia!

  “How’s it going?” Jake said to just about everybody he passed as he cruised up the hall. He was so cool, he could chat with one friend on his cell phone while using his free hand to knock knuckles with a dozen more.

  Jake’s best friend was Kojo Shelton.

  Kojo was a science geek who spent a lot of time streaming detective shows. He called it his extra-credit homework. “Because I’m going to be a detective when I grow up,” he’d say, “I need to know forensic science and TV detectives.”

  Recently, Kojo had stumbled upon an ancient show called Kojak on some obscure cable rerun channel. He’d become obsessed with the famous TV detective. Kojo even adopted Kojak’s famous catchphrase, “Who loves ya, baby?”

  “We practically have the same name,” he’d told Jake. “He’s Kojak and I’m Kojo. Of course, he’s a bald, old Greek dude and I’m a handsome, young Black dude, but, hey—we both like Tootsie Pops.”

  “I don’t,” said Jake. “Too much work sucking through that hard candy shell to get to the Tootsie Roll.”

  “For real? Jake McQuade, you are the laziest kid in the world. You know that, right?”

  “We’re all good at something, Kojo. Slothfulness? It’s my superpower.”

  Kojo was kind of skinny and always wore the style of thick-rimmed glasses that couldn’t get broken when you played sports.

  “You wanna go hang in the cafeteria?” asked Jake. “I’ve got that new Revenge of the Brain Dead game on my phone. Mr. Keeney will never miss us.”

  Mr. Keeney, who taught math, was Jake and Kojo’s homeroom teacher. He usually spent the first fifteen minutes of every school day with his feet propped up on his desk, his chair tilted back as far as it could go without tipping over, and his eyes closed.

  “This is homeroom,” he’d said once. “If I were home, I’d still be sleeping. So keep quiet. I need a nap.”

  “No thanks, man,” Kojo told Jake. “I want to go talk to Mr. Lyons in his office. I need his help on an extra-credit social studies project.”

  “Is it about the history of this school’s vice principal having his office inside an old janitor’s closet complete with a mop sink?”

  “Nah. Everybody knows the answer to that one: the boy’s bathroom on the second floor leaks through the ceiling of the vice principal’s office. Has for years. If Mr. Lyons used that office, his hair would be wet. All the time.”

  “And why are you doing another extra-credit project?”

  “Because, Jake, even though I could get by on my looks, I prefer to be smart, too. Going
for another straight-A report card.”

  Jake shrugged. “Straight Cs are fine by me.”

  “You need help on your science homework?”

  “Nah. I need to go slay some zombies.”

  As Jake ambled along the hallway, he saw Grace Garcia hanging a poster on the wall.

  Jake wished there were a bathroom mirror nearby.

  There wasn’t.

  Grace, another seventh grader, was, without a doubt, the smartest student in the whole school. Jake also thought she was the prettiest. Of course, he’d never tell her that.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “Hey,” she said back. Grace was somehow related to Mr. Lyons. Her mom and dad had emigrated from Cuba during the mid-1990s. Mr. Lyons’s side of the family had moved to America way earlier, but Grace still called him “Uncle Charley.”

  “Whatcha doin’?” Jake asked. Yes, he definitely had a way with words when talking to girls.

  Grace nodded at the poster. “Trying to find two new teammates for our Quiz Bowl team. Last year we came in third. This year we’re going to win! ¡Comerme un pan!”

  Jake nodded. And smiled. And had no idea what comerme un pan meant. Judging from the way Grace grinned when she said it, though, it was probably a good thing.