PLEASE RETURN TO: Book #2
Middle Grade Fiction; Humor; Action; Adventure; Epistolary; Middle Grade
Publisher: INtense Publications LLC
Published Date: March 27, 2020
Toby Solano is the new kid in town. No one in Mapleton knows he exists, which is tough to swallow for a boy who descends from Lucha Libre wrestling royalty. Back in El Paso, Toby could snap his fingers and the seas would part as he walked the hallways at his old school.
But when his dad gets body slammed into submission and his career goes into a tailspin, Toby decides to take his anger out on his classmates, which gets him kicked out of school and shipped off to Mapleton with his mom.
Toby hates his new town, he hates his classmates and, most of all, he hates Mr. Finkelstein. But when he finds his teacher’s missing journal under the tires of a moving truck, the drama of the famed Mapleton Wrestling Federation opens wide for him. Armed with a journal’s-worth of wrestling lore, will Toby be able to build friendships and help the Mort-tician regain his title? Or, will he fall back on his old ways and bully himself right out of Mapleton Middle School? Find out on the slightly-wrinkled pages of Please Return To: Toby Solano.
Excerpt:
“I took a quick loop around the condiment
station, selecting the biggest and fullest bottle of Red Hot Mama Lucia’s Red
Hot Sauce. And I casually twisted off the safety cap meant to provide a slow
and non-excruciating drip-drip of hot sauce to your food, replacing it with
nothing at all.
The
bottle had been successfully converted to ‘intense pour mode’ and all I’d have
to do was apply a volcanic dose to Jimmy’s unsuspecting milk carton--which I
did in one quick dump as I swept past his table and sat back in front of my
tray to enjoy the show. I figured Jimmy wouldn’t know what hit him until he was
in the bathroom hacking up pepper seeds. I thought I’d finally get a few laughs
out of Mapleton after struggling through so many boring nights in this dopey
town.
I
was wrong.
When
Jimmy sat down in front of his carton, I noticed he wasn’t in front of his
carton at all--or at least not the carton I thought was his carton. I had
miscalculated by one seat, and the unlucky winner of the volcanic milk lottery
was Maya Providence, totally unsuspecting as she nudged her glasses up the
bridge of her nose and pushed the carton to her lips.
Maya
drank it. All of it. In two big gulps.
It
took a few seconds for the heat to register on Maya’s face, but when it did, it
rose in bright red hives and a million beads of sweat. Her eyes bugged out of
their sockets like she was possessed by a demon. Her hair stood on end. She
clasped both hands over her mouth and raced for the girls’ bathroom in the far
corner of the cafeteria. The entire middle school population crashed down on
her in a tidal wave of laughter...minus one.
And
that one was me.”
About the Author
Frank Morelli is the author of No Sad Songs, a 2019 YALSA Quick Picks nominee and winner of an American Fiction Award for best coming of age story. The first book in his debut middle grade series, Please Return To: Norbert M. Finkelstein, was released in September 2019. His fiction and essays have appeared in The Saturday Evening Post, Cobalt Review, Philadelphia Stories, and Jersey Devil Press. A Philadelphia native, Morelli now lives in High Point, NC where he has been a classroom teacher for almost twenty years. He holds an MFA in Fiction from National University and thinks dogs are the most respectable beings on the planet. Connect with him on Twitter @frankmoewriter or on his website frankmorelliwrites.com.
Contact Links
Twitter: @frankmoewriter
Instagram: @frankmorelliauthor
Purchase Links
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