David Lubar

When ordinary third-grader Ed finds a coin with the words "strange" and "stranger" on both sides, weird things start happening around him--but when his friends start blaming him for all the weirdness Ed wonders if this coin is not too strange for comfort.

Ed, his friends, and even his little sister are eager to go to Dinosaur Discovery, but ever since he found the magic coin called Silver Center, strange things happen around Ed--so he is not surprised to find that a blue dinosaur has followed his sister home.

Following a difficult freshman year, Scott Hudson is hoping that sophomore year will be easier, but after a disaster of a first week he finds himself faced with new challenges--including a particularly demanding English teacher, a school board member whose budget cutting is covering up a crime, and the discovery that his friendship with Lee, the Goth girl he met last year, is turning into something else entirely.

While navigating his first year of high school and awaiting the birth of his new baby brother, Scott loses old friends and gains some unlikely new ones as he hones his skills as a writer.