Sophomore Undercover

This irreverent debut follows 14-year-old Dixie Nguyen, the only Vietnamese person in his California small town (he's adopted), a social outcast and wannabe journalist. The lone reporter for his high school paper, Dixie glimpses one of the jocks in the locker room receiving an injection and finally has something newsworthy to write about. Launching his own crazy, convoluted investigation, Dixie uncovers a conspiracy involving drugs made in Canada and imported to the U.S. under cover of a pharmaceutical company, then sold to a mysterious albino student who passes them on to the school's perpetually losing football team. The characterizations match the over-the-top plotting; for example, the school counselor asks to be called Huggy Bear. Though it's hard to keep track of the ridiculous connections Dixie makes, his investigation will be funny and compelling to readers who like Esch's in-your-face humor (Dixie's first adoptive father was “a figurative 'bleeding heart' Berkeley professor, who became a literal bleeding heart Berkeley professor after a car crash two months into the adoption experiment”). Ages 14–up. (Feb.)