Geeger the Robot Goes to School: A QUIX Book

by Jarrett Lerner, Serge Seidlitz (Illustrator)

Overview

Amelia Bedelia meets James Patterson’s House of Robots series in the adventures of Geeger, a robot who goes to school for the very first time, in the first story in a new, fun-to-read Aladdin QUIX chapter book series that’s perfect for emerging readers!

Geeger the Robot is going to school. But not robot school...a school with kids, the human kind! Geeger isn’t used to human ways, and his zany misunderstandings and overly literal responses to instructions lead to quite a few mishaps. He’s starting to wonder if he can even make it until snack time! Will a bot made of wires, nuts, and bolts fit in with a classroom of kids?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781534452169
Publisher:	Aladdin
Publication date:	09/22/2020
Series:	Geeger the Robot
Pages:	80
Product dimensions:	4.90(w) x 7.40(h) x 0.30(d)
Lexile:	630L (what's this?)
Age Range:	5 - 8 Years

About the Author

Jarrett Lerner is the award-winning creator of more than a dozen books for kids, including the EngiNerds series of middle grade novels, the Geeger the Robot series of early chapter books, the Hunger Heroes series of graphic chapter books, two activity books, the illustrated novel in verse A Work in Progress, and the Nat the Cat series of early readers. You can find him online at JarrettLerner.com and on X and Instagram at @Jarrett_Lerner. He lives with his wife and daughters in Massachusetts.

Serge Seidlitz, an English/German hybrid born in Kenya, grew up traveling between the UK and Asia. A steady diet of MTV and Mad magazine fueled his desire to become an illustrator. He combines elements from popular culture with diverse influences to create work that forms an iconic and graphic language. Following his studies in graphic design at Camberwell College of Arts, Serge worked as an in-house designer at Cartoon Network before leaving to focus on illustration.

Read an Excerpt

Chapter 1: Meet Geeger

Editorial Reviews

08/01/2020

K-Gr 2—Science fiction and school humor are combined in this new, early chapter book series. Geeger, an earnest young robot, consumes spoiled food. He converts the waste into electricity to power the town of Amblerville. The book does not question the enormous amount of wasted food in our agricultural and retail systems, but it does wonder what would happen if the waste-munching robot got lonely. And so Geeger attends school, where he mistakes the teacher's globe for a giant moldy fruit and almost eats a jump rope at recess. The stakes could not be lower and tension remains minimal. Geeger briefly loses his backpack and finds it again. He frets about making friends, and a girl introduces herself before he sets foot in the building. The teacher proves unfailingly patient, even when he eats her classroom tools. The book, like Geeger, has a goofy amiability but never becomes riotously funny; the illustrations reflect the written content, rather than introduce any amusing or insightful visual disconnect. The QUIX books aim to distinguish themselves from competitor Scholastic Branches by offering text features such as a glossary and questions about the story. The brief glossary definitions are clear, and the defined words are bolded in the text. But so are character names, some of Geeger's dialogue, and some other words, which dilutes the effect. The questions focus on reading comprehension and text-to-self connections, and will likely be ignored by kids reading for pleasure. VERDICT The booming young chapter book market has space for more sci-fi and an eternal appetite for school stories; this series kickoff will satisfy many burgeoning readers.—Robbin E. Friedman, Chappaqua Lib., NY

School Library Journal

2020-06-30
The first day of school can be scary even if you’re a robot!

Geeger is a robot constructed to eat everything humans don’t want to, like moldy mac and cheese and rotten eggs. Then at night he connects to the DIGEST-O-TRON 5000, which turns that refuse into electricity to power the town of Amblerville. But Geeger is lonely, so he decides to go to school, where he will surely make a friend. He is so nervous about his first day he accidentally eats his backpack. On his way to school he meets Tillie, who likes to jump-rope. Ms. Bork introduces him to the class, and Tillie’s thumbs-up helps to put them at ease as he introduces himself…but then he makes a mistake and eats the class globe (it looks so much like moldy fruit). It is hard for him to overcome his mechanical brain’s order to “EAT! EAT! EAT! EAT! EAT!” Fortunately, Ms. Bork doesn’t get too angry, and recess is fun! This agreeably silly robot tale kicks off a new series of very early chapter books. Ample illustrations that frequently and humorously extend the text, large type (set in boldface for new vocabulary words), a glossary, and comprehension questions make this a solid choice for fledgling chapter-book readers. Elementary-age children will identify with Geeger’s nervousness, his fear of making a mistake, and his impulse control even as they laugh at his antics. Line drawings depict humans with paper-white skin, but names suggest diversity among Geeger’s human classmates.

Welcome, Geeger! (Fiction. 5-8)

Kirkus Reviews