Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain by Jarrett J. Krosoczka, a Mysterious Review.

Review: The Lunch Lady is faced with the mystery of the missing technology in Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain, the 9th graphic novel in this series by Jarrett J. Krosoczka.

Thompson Brook school is holding an election for student president, and the opponents couldn't be more opposite: the geek versus the jock. But campaigning is made difficult for both sides when electronic devices start to go missing. The Lunch Lady is on the case, but with most of her arsenel of high-tech weapons no where to be found, she resorts to using a simple smart phone to catch the thief. Meanwhile, the Thompson Brook has a new superintendent, one who intends to make big changes at the school, starting with the cafeteria.

Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain starts with a clever — though unrelated to the story — opening gambit, introducing readers to this crime fighter. But the main story falls a little flat, mostly because the Lunch Lady isn't able to use — or for some reason has chosen not to use — weapons uniquely adapted from her cafeteria in her quest to identify the technology thief, one of the hallmarks of this series. The virtual fight at the end, however, punches up the action (as it were). The election subplot has its moments, but doesn't push the edge of parody as much as it probably should, relying instead on fairly stock characters, actions, and situations. The ending is something of a cliffhanger, setting up what will no doubt be the plot of the next book in the series, a confrontation between the Lunch Lady and the new superintendent … and possibly the return of a cyborg substitute teacher.

These graphic novels have been quite entertaining to date, but the present one, while enjoyable, is not up the usual standard of the series.

Acknowledgment: Random House provided a copy of Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain for this review.

Lunch Lady and the Video Game Villain

A Lunch Lady Comic Mystery by Jarrett J. Krosoczka