16. THE ADVENTURES OF RATBOY – Middle Grade Adventure

Mentor Name: Thomas Torre

Mentee Name: Andrea Pelleschi

Title: THE ADVENTURES OF RATBOY

Category: Middle Grade

Genre: Adventure

Word Count: 57,000

Pitch:

When twelve-year-old, Ryan uses a pen from his favorite comic book artist, his own characters come to life right from the page—even the villains. Now Ryan has to team up with the hero, Ratboy and his sidekick, a talking rat, before Dastard Lee turns everyone Ryan loves into mindless slaves.

Excerpt:

I twirled the Green Lantern ring on my finger and glanced around the classroom. No one was paying attention to me, which was perfect. I didn’t want anyone making fun of my comic book, The Adventures of Ratboy, or worse yet, stealing my super cool idea.

Using my favorite pencil, I drew Chip wearing his golden Ratboy costume: a leotard with shorts, tights, and a cape. It was standard fare for a superhero, even if he was just twelve years old.

Next to him, I penciled in his best friend and sidekick, Herman, a talking rat who also happened to be a genius. Together, they’d been defeating evil villains for all twelve issues of my comic book.

“Ready, little buddy?” asked Chip in his speech bubble.

“Always,” said Herman in his own speech bubble. He gripped his salad fork weapon in his tiny paw and slipped under the locked door of the donut shop.

Chip used his rat superpowers to flatten his body like a squished bug. He followed Herman into the shop and puffed back to normal size.

Behind the counter, I sketched in Dastard Lee, evil villain extraordinaire. He stood tall and slender in his white lab coat as he mixed up another batch of hypno-donuts. If Chip and Herman didn’t stop him, he would soon have Jefferson Middle School under his control, and after that, the entire world. At least the donut-eating world.

RIIIIIIIP!!!!

Someone grabbed my drawing and yanked it out of my sketchbook.