The Rotten Adventures of Zachary Ruthless

This is a fun first installment of a new series, and a good choice for reluctant readers ready to move past Captain Underpants into another silly adventure. The chapters are short, the wacky plot never stops moving, and readers will find plenty to laugh at throughout the book. Zachary may be a wannabe evil mastermind -- he hasn't quite mastered his cackle and has to shop the close-out items on evilbadguystuff.com -- but readers will be impressed that he remains committed to being rotten throughout (when he begins searching for the mayor's zombie laser, his freckled henchman Newt assumes he plans to destroy it and save the town. Really Zachary wants to use the laser himself. "Saving the town is kind of against the whole point of this," Zachary reminds Newt). He's also got some style, shuddering at the bad puns thrown about by the book's other evil characters.

Clever comic book-style illustrations of famous evil villains, such as Dr. Felonious Freckles (whose freckles are in the shape of small rats) and instruments of evil (like a rocket that will destroy all life that has the words "Happy Fuzzy Children's Books" printed on its side to disguise it), add to the book's humorous, far-fetched tone -- and will keep kids flipping through pages. And looking forward to the next rotten adventure.