MIDDLE SCHOOL: ULTIMATE SHOWDOWN, by James Patterson and Julia Bergen

The story: Rafe and his sister Georgia are back! Sibling rivalry, nothing: they're putting on the gloves to duke it out over a whole bunch of different middle school topics, like their spoofs of the Gettysburg Address, their take on bullies, and whether school dances are torture or tons of fun. Keep track as you go along to see who wins the Ultimate Showdown!

June Cleaver’s ratings: Language PG (lots of fart talk); Nudity G; Sexual Content G; Violence G; Substance Abuse G; Magic & the Occult G; GLBT Content G; Adult Themes PG (bullying); overall rating G.

Liz's comments: If you haven't read the earlier books in Patterson's Middle School series, it might take you, like, 30 seconds to figure out what's going on here. Rafe and Georgia are very close in age, but totally opposite in personality, so their views of middle school are pretty much polar opposites, which is part of what makes this book so fun. It's really not clear how much of the writing is done by Patterson and how much by the sub-author listed in the small print (Julia Bergen on this one), and it's not quite fair that Patterson has so many blockbuster series going on all at the same time (possible because of the afore-mentioned sub-authors!) but this one is funny and fun, and boys especially will cheer for Rafe, a very likable rule breaker.