
Part of Series
When middle-school mishaps happen, five friends form the S.M.A.R.T. Squad and use their collective skills and the power of STEM to bring order to their school. Join Izzy Newton in the second adventure of this fun new fiction series, where science reigns supreme. With their first mystery solved and first-day jitters triumphantly behind them, Izzy and her pals—-the S olving M ysteries and R evealing T ruths Squad—-start to settle in to the normal day-to-day at Atom Middle School. Izzy even works up the courage to try out for an all-boys sports team! Things are going well until a mysterious illness threatens to shut down the media center—-and maybe the entire school. The S.M.A.R.T. Squad is on the case in a race to figure out what ails them. But that's not all. A pop-up science fair causes excitement and tension for the Squad. And Izzy's failure to speak up in her speech class feels like an obstacle she can't overcome. Can the girls pull together to solve the media center mystery? Will their STEM smarts help them rock the science fair? Or will Izzy Newton's flaws mean the end of the S.M.A.R.T. Squad? Plus, learn more about the real science behind the fiction and meet some amazing real-life scientists. Join award-winning author and American Girl series co-creator Valerie Tripp and the diverse, brilliantly brainy S.M.A.R.T. Squad gang in this charming second book in the series . And don't forget to check out the first book in the series, Izzy Newton and S.M.A.R.T. Squad: Absolute Hero. Praise for the series: It's one thing to have children's books about scientists or podcasts or stories about strong women in STEM, but it's another world entirely when your children get to feel represented by the characters they're reading about. -Romper
Author

Valerie Tripp is a children's book author, best known for her work with the American Girl series. She grew up in Mount Kisco, New York with three sisters and one brother. A member of the first co-educated class at Yale University, Tripp also has a M.Ed. from Harvard. Since 1985 she has lived in Silver Spring, Maryland. Her husband teaches history at Montgomery College. Right out of college, Tripp started writing songs, stories, and nonfiction for The Superkids Reading Program, working with Pleasant Rowland, the founder of American Girl. For that series, Tripp wrote all the books about Felicity, Josefina, Kit, Molly, and Maryellen and many of the books about Samantha. She also wrote the "Best Friends" character stories to date, plays, mysteries, and short stories about all her characters.. Film dramatizations of the lives of Samantha, Felicity, Molly, and Kit have been based on her stories. Currently, Tripp is writing a STEM series for National Geographic and adapting Greek Myths for Starry Forest Publishing. A frequent speaker at schools and libraries, Tripp has also spoken at the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian, The New York Historical Society, and Williamsburg.