Looking for writing advice? Check out my free on-line video series, Mission: Write!

I am thrilled to finally announce a project that I have been working on with Simon & Schuster for the past year:

Whether you’re a young writer looking for tips, a teacher hoping to educate your students about creative writing, or a homeschooler looking for some fun new lessons, Mission: Write should appeal to you.  There are currently six videos (with more coming in the future) hosted by me — and accompanying lesson plans written by the brilliant educator, Rose Brock.

Best of all, it’s free!  So take a look for yourself.  Just click here to watch and learn!

The reveal you’ve been waiting for: The title, cover and plot of Spy School 11

Lots and lots of people have been asking about this for the past few months.  So here you go:

 

 

In the eleventh book in the New York Times bestselling Spy School series, Ben Ripley goes on a rescue mission when one of his own is abducted from a remote Alaskan training facility.

Ben Ripley and his friends are training in Alaska when Cyrus Hale is kidnapped by his old Russian nemesis. Ben, Erica, and the others mount a rescue mission, but events quickly spiral out of control in a plot involving the secret history of US-Russian relations, a young KGB agent with skills to rival Erica’s—and lots and lots of bears.

Available everywhere October 3, 2023

Click here to pre-order it!

I am aware that there is not a whole lot of information in that synopsis.  The reason for that is, the more you know about a book before you read it, the less fun it will be to read.  I don’t want to ruin any surprises. So if you write to me and ask for more information about what happens, in this book, I’m not going to give it to you.  I’m just going to tell you to re-read this page again.

The exclusive edition of the Spy Camp Graphic Novel is now available for pre-order!

Once again, I have teamed up with Barnes & Noble to create an awesome exclusive edition of one of my books.  In addition to getting Spy Camp in graphic novel form, gorgeously and hilariously illustrated by Anjan Sarkar, you will also get a double-sided pull-out poster with plenty of bonus content.

And yet, even with this extra material, THE COST OF THE EXCLUSIVE EDITION IS EXACTLY THE SAME AS THE COST OF THE REGULAR EDITION.

Click here to preorder your copy today!

I am releasing six books in 2023. Here’s the list.

2023 is going to be a big year for me.  I will have six books come out, four of them by May 9.

Of course, I list all upcoming releases on the right hand side of every page of this website, but I figured I’d give you a little more info about each book in this handy list.

February 21: Whale Done

In the eighth book in the FunJungle series, Teddy Fitzroy tries to figure out who is behind the death of a whale — and the very messy destruction of its corpse — while also contending with the mysterious theft of several tons of sand from a  beach and a threat to his relationship with Summer.

Click here to preorder it.

 

March 14: Bruce Wayne: Not Super

DC Comics hired me to write a Batman graphic novel!  In this story, teenaged Bruce Wayne struggles with the fact that he’s the only kid at his school who doesn’t have super powers — and yet, he’s the only one who wants to fight crime.  It’s a whole new take on the DC Universe, with incredible and hilarious art by Berat Pekmezci.

Click here to preorder it.

 

April 4: Spy Camp the Graphic Novel

Book two of the Spy School series has Ben Ripley joining Erica Hale and her father on a wild adventure through the wilderness.  The fate of the free world hangs in the balance.  Now in graphic novel form, with incredible art (once again) by Anjan Sarkar.

Click here to preorder it.

 

May 9: The Sea of Terror (Once Upon A Tim Book #3)

Tim, Belinda, Rover, and all the rest of the misfits are back in a new adventure that will take them across the incredibly-dangerous Sea of Terror to recover a golden fleece (and the mystical amulet in its pocket).

Click here to preorder it

 

I do not have cover images or summaries (or even titles) yet for the next two books, but here they are anyhow.  I promise, I will get you more info on both these books as soon as it is good to release:

October 3: Spy School Goes North

November 7: Once Upon A Tim 4

I hope all of you have a great holiday season!

 

Here’s the cover, title and plot of Once Upon A Tim #3!

Once Upon A Tim book #2: The Labyrinth of Doom comes out next Tuesday (November 1).  So what better way is there to celebrate than revealing the cover, title and plot of book #3?

Here you go:

After helping Princess Grace foil the villainous Prince Ruprecht—twice!—junior knights Tim, Belinda, and Ferkle are on a new quest—this time to recover the Queen of Merryland’s precious golden fleece (and more importantly, the protective amulet in its pocket) from the Kingdom of Dinkum. The safety of all Merryland depends upon them.

But first, they must face the deadly Sea of Terror and the dastardly perils it contains. Tim and his friends will have to use every ounce of bravery, valor, and intelligence they possess to navigate the treacherous waters—or else risk becoming flotsam on the waves.

This book comes out on May 9, 2023…

But you can already preorder it by clicking here.

The exclusive edition of Whale Done is now available for preorder from Barnes & Noble

I am pleased to announce that Barnes & Noble is releasing an exclusive edition on Whale Done, the eighth book in the FunJungle series.  (For those of you keeping track, this will be the 17th exclusive edition of my books that B&N has released.)

Each edition comes with several pages of bonus content, written by me — and a special book jacket — all for the exact same price as the regular edition.  That’s right: Extra stuff.  Same price.

Click here to order your copy now!

Here’s the pitch:  After an escaped kangaroo starts a fire that burns down his house, Teddy Fitzroy accepts an invitation to go to Malibu with his girlfriend, Summer, and her mother, Kandace. He’s hoping to spend some time relaxing on the beach, but wherever Teddy goes, trouble isn’t far behind.

First, a massive dead whale has washed up on the beach—and before anyone can determine what killed it, it explodes. Doc, the head vet from FunJungle, suspects something fishy is going on and ropes Teddy and Summer into helping him investigate.

Then, Teddy stumbles upon yet another mystery involving tons of stolen sand. And the paparazzi start spreading rumors about Summer dating a celebrity, leading Teddy to question their relationship.

Without Summer as his trusted partner, can Teddy navigate the rough waters of this glitzy world and uncover what’s going on?

Available everywhere books are sold on February 21, 2023.

The exclusive edition of Spy School Project X is now available from Barnes & Noble!

Good news!  As has been the case with every Spy School novel since Evil Spy School, there will be an exclusive edition of Spy School Project X.

This B&N limited collector’s edition of Spy School Project X, the tenth book in Stuart Gibbs’s New York Times bestselling Spy School series, featuring an exclusive jacket with shiny red foil–plus 10 pages of bonus content that will feature “top ten” lists such as Ben Ripley’s Top Ten Least Favorite Action Sequences (Because of How Scary They Were), Erica Hale’s Top Ten Martial Arts Moves, Mike Brezinski’s Top Ten Things James Bond Movies Get Wrong About Spying, The Top Ten Lessons from Spy School and many more!

And if you pre-order it now, it’s even CHEAPER than the regular hardcover.

Click here to get it!

Cover and Plot Reveal for FunJungle 8 (And the Cover Reveal for the Spy Camp Graphic Novel as well)

Two covers to debut today!  But first, let’s start with the big news you’ve been waiting for.  Here’s the cover of the new FunJungle:

As you may have deduced, this plot concerns a whale.  Here’s the details:

After an escaped kangaroo starts a fire that burns down his house, Teddy Fitzroy accepts an invitation to go to Malibu with his girlfriend, Summer, and her mother, Kandace. He’s hoping to spend some time relaxing on the beach, but wherever Teddy goes, trouble isn’t far behind.

First, a massive dead whale has washed up on the beach—and before anyone can determine what killed it, it explodes. Doc, the head vet from FunJungle, suspects something fishy is going on and ropes Teddy and Summer into helping him investigate.

Then, Teddy stumbles upon yet another mystery involving tons of stolen sand. And the paparazzi start spreading rumors about Summer dating a celebrity, leading Teddy to question their relationship.

Without Summer as his trusted partner, can Teddy navigate the rough waters of this glitzy world and uncover what’s going on?

The book is scheduled for release on February 21, 2023.  But if you want…

Click here to order it!

Now, I suspect that a few of you may have questions, so here are the answers to two of them:

Why did I pick a whale?

Because lots of people asked for one.  I figure that, over the years, more people have asked me for a whale mystery than any other animal.

Why does this one not place at FunJungle?

Because the victim is a blue whale.  And no zoo, not even FunJungle, has a blue whale on exhibit.  It simply can’t be done.

And now, for all of you excited to see the cover for Spy Camp the Graphic Novel:

This book will be available on April 4, 2023.  But once again…

Click here to preorder it!

HUGE NEWS: I wrote a Batman graphic novel for DC — and it’s coming out March 14, 2023

On March 14, 2023, I will realize a lifelong dream:  Publishing an honest-to-goodness Batman graphic novel with DC.  The project has been in the works for over three years, but I have been sworn to secrecy by DC — until now.

 

Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been a huge fan of Batman.  Because Batman was just about the only superhero that I could be.  He had no super powers.  He wasn’t bitten by a radioactive animal or given a magical object by aliens.  He was just a normal guy (albeit a very rich one) who used his brains, his skills and some cool gadgets to defeat evil.

So the idea that I could actually get to write a Batman story is a dream come true.

The story of how it all came to happen is kind of a long one, but the short version is that, around three years ago, I was invited to come to the DC Comics offices to discuss doing a graphic novel project with them.  The exec in charge actually asked me ‘Is there any chance you’d be interested in writing a Batman?’ at which point I exclaimed ‘YES YES YES!’

I was so excited by the idea that I think I hatched the whole story on the way home from the meeting.  I had to go through a few rounds of pitching them the idea, but they agreed to do it right around the time that Covid hit.  I wrote the script way back then, but it has taken quite a while to get the art done — because, in all honesty, the art is INCREDIBLE.

The artist is Berat Pekmeczi and I could not be more thrilled with it.  It is dynamic and hilarious and fantastic.

Click here to preorder it!

You can click here to learn more.

Here’s the pitch from the DC website:

On sale February 7, 2023, Bruce Wayne: Not Super follows a 13-year-old Bruce Wayne as he attends an exclusive prep school for the gifted. But, in this book written by Stuart Gibbs (Spy School) with art by Berat Pekmezci (Flash), this school is for the super-gifted. Bruce doesn’t stand a chance of winning a race against the future Flash, or a swim meet against the future Aquaman, and he always gets picked last for dodgeball.

It’s hard enough being in middle school, but it’s even worse when you’re the only kid at your school who doesn’t have super-powers. Bruce does have a goal though: he wants to make a difference in the world. But how can he do that when he doesn’t have any powers? While the Future-Supers are currently content to simply use their gifts to glide through school and court popularity, Bruce struggles to figure out if he has any gifts at all — and if so, how to use them. His challenge comes when he discovers fellow student Jack Napier and his hired bully Bane shaking down lesser-powered students for money, including that hapless kid Dick Grayson. Someone must stand up to them and somehow, it’s going to be Bruce!

Bruce Wayne: Not Super represents an alternate origin story for Batman and a number of other iconic DC characters, imagining them all as school age kids and with Bruce as the misfit. Filled with a lot of humor, this is a light-hearted take on a well-known and beloved character.

UPDATE:  You may have noticed that the date for the release of this graphic novel has moved back a month since this post was originally published.  That’s because there was a conflict between the release dates between this graphic novel and my next FunJungle book, Whale Done.  This way, I’ll be able to spend more time focusing on the release of each book.

 

Hope Wins now available!

I, along with many of my favorite writers (and probably yours), have contributed to this amazing anthology:

In a collection of personal stories and essays, award-winning and bestselling authors write about how hope always wins, even in the darkest of times.  Here are just a few of the people who contributed to this book: Tom Angleberger, Sarah Mlynowski, Max Brallier, Julie Buxbaum, Pablo Cartaya, J. C. Cervantes, Rex Ogle, Matt de la Peña, Adam Gidwitz, R.L. Stine, Veera Hiranandani, Hena Khan, Karina Yan Glaser, James Ponti, Soman Chainani, Pam Munoz Ryan, Christina Soontornvat and Gordon Korman.  And oh yeah, the cover art is by Vashti Harrison, and the whole book is edited by the amazing Rose Brock.

I have read all these stories, and they are all truly wonderful.  If you have ever wanted to know more about the lives of your favorite authors, this is your chance.

The book is now available everywhere books are sold. Get it now by clicking here.