Archives de catégorie : Middle Grade

FATHOM FORCE de Mike de Seve

Dive into a world of adventure, where four ordinary teensbecome extraordinary ocean protectors.

FATHOM FORCE
by Mike de Seve
TBD
(via The Lennon-Ritchie Agency)

Four ordinary teens find themselves with extraordinary powers to transform into sea creatures when an ancient order recruitsthem to protect the world’s oceans. Guided by their mentor Pierre and a shape-shifting vessel endowed with the collectiveconsciousness of the Elders, heroes Jaden, Parker, Yu Qi and Logan must dig deep and discover that they have what it takes tostop worldwide evil from destroying the world’s oceans. Together they are … the Fathom Force!

Mike de Seve is an Emmy-nominated animation writer and director working in feature films and television. He is founder of Baboon Animation, acollective of some of the most accomplished animation writers in the US, with 31 Emmys among them and clients including Disney, Netflix,Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, and Warner Brothers. At DreamWorks, Mike was a script consultant on six films, including Madagascar (on which hewas also a sequence director), Shrek 2 and Shrek 3, and he co-wrote the original story, with Mark Osborne, for Monsters VS Aliens. At Paramount,Mike was a director and writer on the feature film Beavis and Butt-Head Do America. In Television, Mike has head-written for and/or directed suchiconic series as Angry Birds Toons, Sesame Street, Pocoyo and Saturday Night Live, and for numerous major clients such as Disney, WarnerBros., Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon and DreamWorks He’s lately focused on applying his company’s skills and relationships toward progressivecauses – such as the launch of Baboon Animation Africa, integrating BIPOC talent into the industry, and addressing climate change with fun kids’content.

TARZON OF THE EEPS de Mike de Seve

A cyborg’s fight to save his jungle. High satire by Mike de Seve.

TARZON OF THE EEPS
by Mike de Seve
TBD
(via The Lennon-Ritchie Agency)

Planet Eep: home to the Eeps, a colony of stupid little battle robots who evolved to survive in their extraterrestrial jungle. TheEeps rebuilt Tarzon after finding his body, equipping him with self-regenerating biomechanics that grew as he grew. Just asTarzon reached his early cyborg adulthood, humans invaded Planet Eep. Carrying blob technology, the humans’ high-poweredblobcrafts fired blob-lasers all over the planet. To them, Planet Eeb is the perfect setting for a blob-themed amusement park.Tarzon and the Eeps look like primate-level tech compared to the humans’ blobcrafts, but they’ll tear anyone limb from limb todefend their jungle.

Everything changes when Captain Jane Proter arrives. Her family’s own centuries-old pre-colonial past gives her a possible linkto understanding a supposed ‘savage’ like Tarzon. Are the values she now defends as corrupted as she suspects? Tarzon’s simplesense of right, wrong and love for the jungle may be the only hope to save the Eeps and their civilization.

Mike de Seve is an Emmy-nominated animation writer and director working in feature films and television. He is founder of Baboon Animation, acollective of some of the most accomplished animation writers in the US, with 31 Emmys among them and clients including Disney, Netflix,Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, and Warner Brothers. At DreamWorks, Mike was a script consultant on six films, including Madagascar (on which hewas also a sequence director), Shrek 2 and Shrek 3, and he co-wrote the original story, with Mark Osborne, for Monsters VS Aliens. At Paramount,Mike was a director and writer on the feature film Beavis and Butt-Head Do America. In Television, Mike has head-written for and/or directed suchiconic series as Angry Birds Toons, Sesame Street, Pocoyo and Saturday Night Live, and for numerous major clients such as Disney, WarnerBros., Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon and DreamWorks He’s lately focused on applying his company’s skills and relationships toward progressivecauses – such as the launch of Baboon Animation Africa, integrating BIPOC talent into the industry, and addressing climate change with fun kids’content.

THE ROYAL WITCH d’Emily Kaye

The Fate of a Kingdom: in the hands of two kids who just can’t get along. By YouTube Silver-Play-Button recipient Emily Kaye.

THE ROYAL WITCH
by Emily Kaye
TBD
(via The Lennon-Ritchie Agency)

Each generation, a grand ceremony in the Kingdom of Alveria binds its crown prince to a powerful witch. Jointly, future king andwitch must protect their realm.

Enter timid and awkward Gus. He’s trained his entire life to become the Royal Witch and is absolutely terrified to meet the – sogorgeous – prince. Prince Emilio: confident, self-absorbed, and Gus’s opposite in every way.

In a partnership that seems doomed from the start, things go from bad to worse when Emilio announces in the middle of theceremony that he hates magic and doesn’t want to be the Royal Witch at all. A fight breaks out. Everyone watches in horror asthe two boys, meant to protect their country, brawl it out on the palace floor.

Despite their disastrous tantrum, the ceremony is concluded, leaving them bound together and forced to cooperate.

THE ROYAL WITCH follows the many misadventures of Gus and Emilio as they learn to work together to protect their kingdom.

Based on a Webtoon featured as a Rising Star, Staff Pick, Hot Series, and one of the faces of Webtoon’s 2022 LGBTQ+ Prideevents.

Emily Kaye got her start in social media, writing skits for YouTube and TikTok which gained over 100,000,000+ views and earned her YouTube’s SilverPlay-Button. She branched out into writing webnovels that had millions of views. Her most popular, HERO VS VILLAIN, is ranked as the #1 LGBTQ+novel and the #4 romance novel on Wattpad and is the fourth most liked free-to-read novel on Tapas. HERO VS VILLAIN received a manhwa (comic)adaptation by the Korean studio Toomics and has been optioned for an animated series. Emily specializes in writing queer and female-led stories andwas one of the main faces for Webtoon’s 2021 Pride. She wrote and co-directed the prize-winning short film FREELY WE SERVE, which screened atfestivals including Newfest, Genreblast, the Seattle Queer Film Festival, and PRISM.

A BITE ABOVE THE REST de Christine Virnig

Welcome to Samhain . . .

A BITE ABOVE THE REST
by Christine Virnig
Aladdin, August 2024
(via Dystel, Goderich & Bourret)

Imagine moving to a town where every day is like Halloween: where costumes are worn daily, Halloween decorations stay up year-round, and the town hall looks like a vampire’s castle. Sounds pretty amazing, right? Well, not if you’re Caleb Fisher. Caleb thinks Samhain, Wisconsin, is the strangest place he’s ever been—and not strange in a good way. Strange in a creepy something-is-definitely-not-right-around-here way.

Then things become even stranger when a terrifying run-in with the mayor leaves Caleb wondering: Are the citizens of Samhain really just humans playing dress-up as monsters? Or are actual witches and werewolves and blood-sucking vampires hiding in plain sight?

With the help of his best friend, Tai, Caleb sets out to uncover the truth . . . ideally before a werewolf devours them for breakfast, or a witch turns them into earwigs. But if Caleb’s growing suspicions are correct—and he and Tai are the only ones who realize what’s actually going on—can they find a way to save a town that doesn’t want saving?

Christine Virnig makes her kidlit debut with Dung for Dinner. Christine is a pediatric physician specializing in allergies where—in addition to dodging the occasional snot rocket or projectile vomit—she gets to talk about topics that most adults find downright repulsive, like phlegm, snot, and dust mite poo. She lives in Madison, Wisconsin with her husband, two children, and two hairball producers.

THE LIBRARY OF CURIOSITIES de Jenny Lundquist

Rowan will  have to fight forces both within and without the library to keep from mosing everything she holds dear.

THE LIBRARY OF CURIOSITIES
by Jenny Lundquist
Holiday House, April 2025
(via KT Literary)

After being expelled from her boarding school, eleven-year-old Rowan Fitzgerald travels to Fitzgerald Manor—a wondrous estate she never knew her family owned—to live with her secretive, estranged grandfather, only to discover that the library he runs is filled not with books, but magical objects called curiosities. Rowan loves everything about the library: its collection of enchanted objects, its quirky patrons, and the whimsical carousel café where she hangs out with her new friends.

When curiosities start disappearing and suspicion falls upon Rowan she sets out to clear her name before her grandfather sends her away again. In the course of her investigations, she discovers her family and their arch-enemy have been engaged in a centuries-long feud to recover a powerful curiosity called the Everheart, a magical object that can spin the user forward in time.

Little does Rowan know, the Everheart is closer to her than she could ever imagine—and that she’ll have to fight forces both within and without the library keep from losing everything she holds dear.

Jenny Lundquist is the author of eight middle-grade and young adult titles including Seeing Cinderella, The Charming Life Of Izzy Malone, The Princess In The Opal Mask, among others. Her adult debut contemporary fantasy novel The Stars Of Somewhere Else recently sold to Tor and is slated to publish in 2026.