HYPERGIFTED

In the third book in the Ungifted series, hypergifted Noah Youkilis graduates from eighth grade and unwillingly starts off his summer at Wilderton University.

Making matters better (or maybe worse), he gets to bring his best friend, Donovan Curtis, who “barely squeaked through eighth grade,” to help him adjust before the fall semester begins. “Trouble magnet” Donovan will spend his days as a counselor-in-training with fellow 13-year-old Raina Overbrook and five energetic 8-year-olds. Living and working on campus requires way more effort than the lazy summer he’d hoped for. Meanwhile, 13-year-old Noah shows that he’s leaps and bounds ahead of many of the college students as he develops an elite AI program, but he’s behind the curve socially and struggles to fit in with the older students. Noah is bent on joining the university’s top-secret Society of the Gavel, seeing it as a way to finding friends and a great intellectual challenge (he has an IQ of 206). Joining the society proves difficult, however, and Donovan and Noah can’t help but engage in hijinks, including hiding the school mascot—a 300-pound pig—in their dorm room. Will they survive the summer without being caught pig-handed? Told from multiple points of view, the story is laugh-out-loud funny, and readers will be entertained as Noah and Donovan try to make sense of college life. The main characters present white.

A hilarious romp.