Michael K.'s "friends", Bob and Jennifer, say that they are extraterrestrials. He could tell that they were extraterrestrials because Jennifer had eaten half of his pencil and Bob was wearing a pink shirt with the collar sticking up, a clip on tie, and a Dora the Explorer backpack. His "friends" keep putting stickers that have SPHDZ all over stuff in the supermarket. SPHDZ stands for Spaceheadz. The two spaceheadz are planning on taking over the world. Michael K. becomes a Spaceheadz!This is the creepiest quote from the book. "The Spaceheadz name generator gave him his Spaceheadz name. Tasty Fresh: Duct Tape," said Michael K. "Perfect. Only three point one four million more to go." Summary(From Amazon.com) Michael K. just started fifth grade at a new school. As if that wasn't hard enough, the kids who want to be friends with him apparently aren't kids at all. They are aliens. Real aliens who have invaded our planet in the form of school children and a hamster. They have a mission to complete: to convince 3,140,001 kids to BE SPHDZ so that the Earth will not be “turned off” thus depriving the interstellar civilizations of our tasty TV and radio waves containing commercials, jingles and ads. However, Agent Umber of the secretive Anti-Alien Agency (AAA) is on their trail, but as the bumbling, slow guy, and master of many ridiculous disguises he never seems to be in the right place at the right time, nor can he convince anyone that aliens have indeed landed.My CommentsI tried to like this book because I like Jon Scieszka. His Time Warp Trio series is pretty funny, his autobiography is a hoot, and he is a hilarious speaker. I attended a book conference where he promoted this book, and with the digital tie-ins, it seemed like a cool idea for a new series. However, I did not like Spaceheadz at all. It’s weird, relies too much on an overused plot, and there is no character development. The main concentration of the book is the “zany” illustrations and text. There are lots of black and white pages, some pages are in all black with white text; there are crooked pages, upside down pages, pages with just SPHDZ stickers, and then a couple of pages in hamster language ( eeks and squeaks). It seems as if Scieskza is just filling up space with this gimmicky stuff and totally ignoring any kind of plot or character development. Several websites mentioned in the book actually work and are supposed to provide clues to the whole SPHDZ concept and future books. This is a pretty novel idea that I think might appeal to kids. Also, at 163pages, double spaced with lots of blank spaces and illustrations, it’s a quick read, but Diary of a Wimpy Kid is soooo much better. Spaceheadz is definitely a boy book, probably best for ages 7 – 10.
What do You think about Spaceheadz (2011)?
This book was awesome. I thought it was hard to put down from begining to end.
—lex
Cute. Kids will like this book. It's a little spacey.
—wassoncm
it was kinda boring i would not read it if i was anyone
—24542454
North Carolina Children's Book Award Nominee 2012
—Tayanna
