Zodiac Series Book 1:

SIMON LI AND THE ZODIAC CHALLENGE
(middle grade adventure)

Twelve year-old Simon Li thinks he knows what weird is: It’s the gooey blob stuck to the underside of his chair in history class, or when Billy Flannigan turns his eyelids inside out, or the fact that girls smile at him one second and are mean the next.

Weird, right?

Not anymore. Not for Simon.

When Simon’s grandpa breaks his hip, Simon must take his place as the Keeper of the Zodiac and accept a rival’s challenge to his family honor—and not just his honor is at stake. Lives, possibly hundreds of thousands hang in the balance. Crazy, right?

Well, what begins as a bit of fun and games, turns into a dangerous, magical battle of wits as Simon, his brother Chip, and his neighbor, Allie, transform into animals through Grandpa’s old world magic in order to retrieve three of the twelve jade zodiac figurines hidden by the Tu Di Gong, a magical referee to the Challenge.

Simon, Chip and Allie take on a creepy guy on a motorcycle, terracotta warriors, crazed ducks, a cowboy, a broom wielding old woman, Snot Dog, and Frankencow, in their quest to collect the missing figurines.

So that blob under Simon’s history class chair? That’s nothing compared turning into a rat and climbing the skeleton of a Diplodocus in order to retrieve a jade rock from its eye socket—all the while being hassled by magically animated terracotta warriors controlled by a bad guy’s PSP.  Now that is weird.