Lerner Chanse, a new student at Cleveland Park Middle School, finds a worm that magically makes things disappear, and she hopes it will help her fit in, or get revenge, at her hated school.
When someone takes a pet goldfish, then other items from Ms. Herschel's classroom, each time leaving a clue in the form of a poem, student Edgar Allan competes with a classmate to be first to solve the mystery.
Henrietta's two older sister try to convince her she is really a chicken, so Henrietta sets off for the farm to find her real family, and discovers how much fun being a chicken can be.
When Ms. Wurtz leaves a blank book in the Writer's Corner with a note encouraging those who find it to "talk to each other" in its pages, the student's entries spark a classroom-wide battle.
