It’s Ocean’s Eleven set in a summer camp as two kids try to one-up each other in a con competition at a camp that isn’t quite what it seems… For Archie, the start of summer means another stint at Camp Shady Brook, where there is a lot more to the camp than meets the eye—just like Archie and his now blended family. But thanks to a con Archie developed last year, he’s finally somebody…and he’s not going to lose that status to the new girl, Vivian. For Vivian, thanks to an incident That Shall Not Be Named or Spoken Of, her summer of exotic travels with Mom and Dad has turned into traveling to a dump of a summer camp in the middle of nowhere. But thanks to perfect timing, Vivian soon finds herself in a ring of kids trying to out-con each other—and discovers Camp Shady Brook is more like Camp Shady Crook. And when one final, massive con could cost Vivian the first friends she’s had in a while, can she and Archie figure out a way to make things right? Gr 3–7-Camp Shady Brook, also known as Camp Shady Crook, is not as nice as the publicity makes it seem. The cabins, the lake, and all the activities are meant to attract wealthy campers but the facility leaves something to be desired. What place could be better for Archie Drake, scam artist extraordinaire, to find his marks? Back at home he's a nobody, but at camp everyone thinks he's related to a billionaire. Using his powers of persuasion, Archie can trick almost anyone out of their pocket change. As a self-proclaimed Robin Hood, he only targets wealthy attendees and not scholarship campers like himself. When new camper Vivian shows up and catches onto his schemes, the two rivals form a partnership while continuing to compete. Vivian is not looking for friends and would rather trick others before they can trick her. When they realize there may not be a camp to return to next year, the two must find a way to use their deception for good and to save the camp. While Archie and Vivian aren't always likeable, readers will become invested in following their schemes and wondering how—and if—they will redeem themselves. VERDICT A fun, fast-paced tale recommended for most middle grade collections, especially where camp novels are popular.-Marissa Lieberman, East Orange Public Library, NJ Lee Gjertsen Malone is a Massachusetts transplant via Long Island, Brooklyn, and Ithaca, New York. As a journalist she’s written about everything from wedding planning to the banking crisis to how to build your own homemade camera satellite. Her interests include amateur cheese making, traveling, associating with animals, shushing people in movie theaters, kickboxing, and blinking very rapidly for no reason. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with her husband, daughter, and a rotating cast of pets. Camp Shady Crook ARCHIE DRAKE Twelve-year-old Archie Drake stepped off the bus and took a long, deep breath. He smelled fresh-cut grass; cedar shingles; that dank, dark odor of the lake; and at the very edges of it all, a little bit of campfire. It was good to be back. He stepped away from the doorway of the bus to let the other kids pass and gave them his most casual smile. Already he’d sown the seeds for the first week of camp’s Big Game. It started when his father dropped him off at the strip-mall parking lot, one of the pickup locations for the Camp Shady Brook bus. Camp Shady Brook collected kids every summer from New York City, New Jersey, and Connecticut and drove them deep into New England, where they could spend a week learning archery, water safety, and antiquated campfire songs at a camp nestled into a patch of especially unattractive and straggly woods just outside a completely unremarkable town in Vermont. A week from now more than half of them would head back on the same bus, with new friends, lifelong memories, and more than a few bug bites (the mosquitoes at Shady Brook were notoriously vicious), but without—if Archie’s cons worked out, and they usually did—most of their pocket money and small valuables. Not that it would really matter to them, the way Archie figured it. Most of them had no idea how lucky they were. Archie had arrived at the mall parking lot in his dad’s limo. Well, not actually his dad’s, the limo really belonged to Mr. Carvallo, Dad’s boss at the car service. Dad just drove it around New Jersey, bringing executives to the airport, teenagers to proms, and brides and grooms to weddings. As he said good-bye, Archie played it cool, like he didn’t want a hug, but that wasn’t a problem for his father. Mr. Drake was not a demonstrative man, and he was already late for work. Archie knew how much his dad hated being late. Once Archie got on the bus, he waved stiffly out the window at his father, who stood next to the door of the limousine in his dark suit and white shirt, his hair slicked back with gel, dark sunglasses shielding his eyes. “Good-bye, Jameson!” Archie shouted at the closed window, deliberately loud enough so the kids nearb