Miss Suki Is Kooky!

1
The Weirdest Thing in the History of the World

2
Children's Books Are Dumb

3
I Hate Andrea and She Hates Me

4
Here Comes the Big-Shot Author

5
Miss Suki Finally Arrives

6
Miss Suki Is a Big Crybaby

7
Rappy the Raptor Is Cool

8
Dumb Questions

9
What's the Magic Word?

10
Say Cheese!

11
Just a Minor Problem

12
Author Visits Are Fun!

About the Author and the Illustrator

Credits

Copyright

About the Publisher

My name is A.J. and I hate school.

It was Monday morning, and all the girls were playing with these fake makeup kits that they got at some birthday party over the weekend. I thought I was gonna throw up.

“Picture Day is in three weeks,” said my teacher, Miss Daisy, as she handed us each a piece of paper. “A photographer is going to come and take pictures of every student in school. So make sure your parents fill out this form if they want to order pictures.”

“I
love
getting my picture taken!” said this annoying girl with curly brown hair named Andrea Young. (The girl's name is Andrea Young, that is. Not her hair. Hair doesn't have a name.)

“Me too,” said this crybaby girl named Emily, who always agrees with anything Andrea says.

“They should take your pictures,” I
suggested, “and burn them.”

My friends Ryan and Michael laughed. Emily looked like she was going to cry.

“It just so happens that Emily and I are very photogenic,” Andrea told us.

“Wow!” I said. “You can read minds?”

“‘Photogenic' means you look good in pictures, dumbhead.”

“That's good,” I said, “because you're ugly in real life.”

“Oh, snap!” said Michael.

“Do you know where they should put your picture, Arlo?” asked Andrea.

“Where?” I asked. I hate when she calls me by my real name.

“In the post office,” she said, “with all
those pictures of criminals and bank robbers and murderers.”

“Oh, snap!” said Ryan.

“So is your face,” I told Andrea. Any time somebody says something mean to you, always say, “So is your face.” Even if it doesn't make any sense. That's the first rule of being a kid.

“Enough chitchat,” said Miss Daisy. “We have library now with Mrs. Roopy.”

“Yay!” said all the girls.

“Boo!” said all the boys.

Bummer in the summer! Libraries are boring. Do you know why? Because they're filled with books! And there's nothing more boring than a book. Why are you even reading this one?

Library would be even more boring if we didn't have a librarian like Mrs. Roopy. She's always dressed up like somebody else, whether it's Little Bo Peep or Johnny Appleseed. Mrs. Roopy is loopy.

When we got to the library, we saw Mrs. Roopy dressed up like a giant bird, with lots of feathers and a beak.

“Why are you dressed up like a bird, Mrs. Roopy?” asked Neil, who we call the nude kid even though he wears clothes.

“Squawk! Squawk! Squawk!” shouted Mrs. Roopy as she flapped her wings. “Who's Roopy? My name is Rappy. I'm a peregrine falcon, the main character in
The Fearless Falcon
.
*
It's a wonderful book written and illustrated by the famous children's book author Miss Suki Kabuki.”

Mrs. Roopy read us a few chapters of the book. It's about this falcon that sees its reflection in a window and thinks it's an enemy. So it attacks its own reflection
by flying right into the glass.
Bam!

Man, was that bird dumb.
**

“That's the saddest story I ever heard!” Emily said, with tears in her eyes. That girl will cry over any old thing.

After library we went to the art room. Ms. Hannah, our art teacher, was waiting for us.

“Today we're going to draw pictures of Rappy, the peregrine falcon in
The Fearless Falcon
,” said Ms. Hannah. “It was written and illustrated by the famous children's book author Miss Suki Kabuki.”

Hmm, that was strange. Why were we
doing something with the
same
book in both library
and
art?

After we finished drawing our pictures and cleaning up the art room, it was time to go to music with Mr. Loring.

“Today we're going to sing a song about a falcon named Rappy,” said Mr. Loring. “He's the main character in
The Fearless Falcon
, which was written and illustrated by Miss Suki Kabuki.”

This was getting really weird!

After music class was over, we went to the computer lab.

“Good morning,” said Mrs. Yonkers, our computer teacher. “Today we're going to visit www.sukikabuki.com. That's the
website of children's book author Miss Suki Kabuki.”

What the heck was going on?! How come
all
the teachers were talking about this dumb children's book author? It was the weirdest thing in the history of the world.

After we finished computer lab, we went back to our class to get ready for lunch. Suddenly I heard a knock at the door. Miss Daisy answered it.

It was Mr. Klutz, the principal! He has no hair at all.

“I have big news!” Mr. Klutz announced. “Guess who will be coming to visit our school in three weeks?”

“Who?” we all asked.

“A famous children's book author,” Mr. Klutz said. “Her name is Miss Suki Kabuki!”

So
that
's why all the teachers were talking about Miss Suki Kabuki. She was coming to visit our school. I never met a real live author before. Come to think of it, I never met any dead ones either.

“Wow!” said all the girls.

“Who cares?” said all the boys.

Mr. Klutz was so excited about the author visit, he had to go tell all the other classes the news.

“I
love
Miss Suki Kabuki!” said Andrea, who loves books and anything else that's boring. “She's my favorite author!”

“Never heard of her before today,” I said.

“Well, maybe if you picked up a book once in a while, Arlo, then you would know who she is.”

“Hey, I picked up a book once,” I said. “And then I put it back down again.”

Andrea had to show everybody how smart she was by naming some of Miss Suki Kabuki's books, like
The Fearless
Falcon, The Reluctant Rhino
, and
The Courageous Crane
.

“That's right, Andrea,” said Miss Daisy. “Suki Kabuki has written a lot of great books. She's coming all the way to America
from Japan because she won the Blueberry Award. That's an award that is given for the best children's book of the year. Miss Suki is only visiting a few schools in America, and ours is one of them! We're very lucky our PTA was able to get her.”

“I knew Miss Suki was coming,” said Andrea, who loves telling people how much she knows.

“How did you know?” asked Neil the nude kid.

“My mother is vice president of the PTA,” Andrea said. “She knows everything.”

“I'm sure it was very hard to get Miss Suki to come and visit us,” Miss Daisy
said. “She lives in the rainforest, where she writes all about those animals.”

“I love animals,” Andrea said. “When I grow up, I want to be a veterinarian.”

“You're not going to eat meat?” I asked.

“No, dumbhead,” said Andrea. “That's a
vegetarian
. A veterinarian is an animal doctor.”

“It is not,” I said.

“It is too,” Andrea said.

We went back and forth like that for a while. And then I came up with a genius idea to win the argument.

“Oh, yeah?” I said. “Well, a veterinarian who doesn't eat meat is a vegetarian. So nah-nah-nah boo-boo!”

In her face! No wonder they put me in the gifted and talented program.

“I can't believe Miss Suki is coming to our school,” said Emily, all excited. “Do you think she'll sign autographs?”

“I don't know,” said Miss Daisy, who doesn't know anything. “Maybe she will if you kids are on your best behavior.”

I didn't want Miss Suki's autograph. I had never even heard of her or any of her dumb books before. How come we have to have an author visit anyway? Why can't we have a professional skateboarder instead? That would be cool.

Children's books are dumb, if you ask me. So anybody who writes children's
books must be dumb, too. Except for Dr. Seuss, of course. The only books I read are by Dr. Seuss. He was cool, even if he wasn't a real doctor.

“Why can't we invite Dr. Seuss to our school?” I asked.

“Because he's dead, dumbhead,” said Andrea.

“So is your face,” I replied.