Gianna Z. has less than one week to collect twenty-five leaves for a science project, or else she might lose her spot at cross-country sectionals. Finishing her project will be enough of a hurdle, but with a grandmother who keeps losing her teeth, a father who drives her to school in the family hearse, and an arch-nemesis intent on stealing her spot on the team, Gianna will need a stroke of brilliance to make everything fall into place.

Kate Messner is the author of The Brilliant Fall of Gianna Z and the upcoming Sugar and Ice. She teaches junior high in New York, where she lives with her husband and two children.