Kid vs. Squid

by Greg Van Eekhout

  We stayed on the beach a long time, being close, feeling right.

  After a while, I couldn’t stand it anymore.

  “I swear if we don’t get a pizza right now, I am going to die.”

  Trudy and Shoal punched me. It hurt, and I laughed.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I had a bajillion people help me in various ways with this book, and I guarantee I’m going to forget to thank some of them, so, really, what’s the point in thanking any of them? Okay, okay, I’ll try, but I’ll have to apologize in advance to those whose generous assistance goes unacknowledged here. I’ll make it up to you, I swear.

  From the Blue Heaven 2008 writers workshop: Paolo Bacigalupi, Tobias Buckell, Sarah K. Castle, Deborah Coates, C. C. Finlay, Daryl Gregory, Sandra McDonald, Paul Melko, Jenn Reese, and Catherynne M. Valente. And a particularly ginormous blob of thanks goes to Sarah Prineas, for her constant support and smartitude.

  Gooey thanks as well go to Tim Pratt and Heather Shaw. And, as ever, to Lisa Will.

  I’m also grateful to the awesome Caitlin Blasdell, who navigates me through the tricky waters of the publishing business, and to my editor, Margaret Miller, and her colleagues, who turned a thick stack of my incoherent ramblings into the book you now hold in your hands.

  Finally, a nod to Steve at the Museum of the Weird in Austin, Texas, where I spent part of a pleasant afternoon perusing his displays of wonderfully disgusting things. Best three bucks I ever spent.

  Copyright © 2010 by Greg van Eekhout

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner

  whatsoever without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief

  quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  First published in the United States of America in May 2010

  by Bloomsbury Books for Young Readers

  E-book edition published in April 2011

  www.bloomsburykids.com

  For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to

  Permissions, Bloomsbury BFYR, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10010

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:

  Van Eekhout, Greg.

  Kid vs. squid / by Greg van Eekhout. — 1st U.S. ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: Spending the summer after sixth grade at his great-uncle’s Oceanside

  museum, Thatcher and local girl Trudy team up to help Shoal, one of the people of

  Atlantis cursed by a witch whose head still survives, and who has an army of monstrous

  creatures helping her.

  ISBN 978-1-59990-489-4 (hardcover)

  [1. Imaginary creatures—Fiction. 2. Witches—Fiction. 3. Blessing and cursing—

  Fiction. 4. Seashore—Fiction. 5. Atlantis (Legendary place)—Fiction. 6. Curiosities and

  wonders—Fiction.] I. Title. II. Title: Kid versus squid.

  PZ7.V2744Kid 2010 [Fic]—dc22 2009036040

  ISBN 978-1-59990-794-9 (e-book)