Masterpiece Robot: And the Ferocious Valerie Knick-Knack [Hardcover]

Comic-book action, an innocent backyard, and four siblings with wild imaginations combine to create an adventurous afternoon. A girl of mixed Asian/white descent named Laura heads out into the front yard with her little sister, Molly, to help rake leaves. But Laura has a secret identityMasterpiece Robotand so do her siblings. To them, the outside world offers exciting perils and the potential for adventure. Each vivid, dynamically illustrated spread splits into comic-book panels that alternate between brightly colored reality and a somber comic-book world in which Masterpiece Robot and Sidekick (Molly) battle the Ferocious Valerie Knick-Knack, an older sister, with the help of their brother, Lord MekMek. The children crash and smash through piles of leaves in a sci-fi battle with spaceships, blasters, and robot parts as our heroes try to save the world. Humorous text, split between dialogue and narrative in a manner typical of comic books, asks, Will the world as we know it become forever shrouded in despair, misery, early bedtimes, and extra servings of vegetables?