HOW TO SURVIVE ATOMIC WEDGIES AND SNOW MONSTERS

How to Survive Atomic Wedgies and Snow Monsters is a fun, Howard Boward adventure filled with action, science, humor, weirdness and family warmth. Well, except for the never-ending battles between Howard and his big brother Stick. The book explores the dangers of trying to take shortcuts on the road to popularity--and why you should never be too quick to judge others.... even an alien cyborg.

Determined not to spend another winter as target practice for slushball slingers Kyle, Josh and Dino, Howard retreats into his secret laboratory and attempts to create the world’s first self-propelled, bully-seeking snowball. Naturally, things don’t go as planned. The snowball-of-science is a failure as a super-weapon. But when it begins to bounce rhythmically whenever music is played, Howard has an idea. He’ll build a dancing snowman--no, a half-snowman, half-robot! A snowbot! With the help of electronics wiz Uncle Ben, the project is up and waltzing in no time. The boy who made monsters in his garage is back--and this time, he’s bringing more chills. Howard Boward, a brainy, 12-year-old inventor, took “making friends” to extremes in How to Make Friends and Monsters. But this winter, Howard is focusing on simpler pursuits: he’s making snowmen. Unfortunately, nothing in Howard’s world stays simple for long. What no one around him realizes is that Howard has an ulterior motive for building the snowbot--he wants it to teach him to dance. Funny... dancing always looked goofy when his big sister Katie Beth was doing it, but that all changed after his school was invaded by prombies. “Prombies,” of course, are the glassy-eyed, planning-obsessed creatures that annually replace all the popular girls at Dolley Madison Middle School in the weeks before the winter prom. And now that his ex-friend Winnie McKinney has become one of them, Howard sees peerless dance steps as his only chance to get back in her good graces. Only his scheme backfires when an accident causes the snowbot to stop dancing and turn into an unstoppable, snowball-spewing monster bent on revenge. Worse, it’s multiplying. Before long, Howard is being stalked by a small army of icy-hearted snowmen who pelt him mercilessly at every opportunity. But since the snowbots freeze in place when other people are around, no one believes Howard’s story. It’s not until the snow-meanies begin targeting others that Howard realizes he has to find a way to stop them before they take over the entire town. In the meantime, Howard has found himself on the wrong side of Philo Durst, a mysterious, new kid at school who he strongly suspects is a cyborg from another planet. With the help of his loyal-but-annoying lab assistant Reynolds Pipkin, Howard sets out to uncover Philo’s secrets--including the alien technology he pulls out of his head! In the end, it will take all of Howard’s scientific knowledge and groovy dance moves to defeat the attacking snowbots, help his new friend Philo and regain the trust of Winnie McKinney.