Dan Gutman - Geography

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Courtesy of Dan Gutman and Jim Paillot

DAN GUTMAN has written many weird books for kids. He lives with his weird wife in New York (a very weird place). You can visit him on his weird website at www.dangutman.com.

JIM PAILLOT lives in Arizona (another weird place) with his weird wife and two weird children. Isnt that weird? You can visit him on his weird website at www.jimpaillot.com.

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Cover art 2016 by Jim Paillot

Cover photo 2016 by Hiroshi Higuchi/Getty Images

The author gratefully acknowledges the editorial contributions of Laurie Calkhoven.

MY WEIRD SCHOOL FAST FACTS: GEOGRAPHY. Text copyright 2016 by Dan Gutman. Illustrations copyright 2016 by Jim Paillot. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

www.harpercollinschildrens.com

ISBN 978-0-06-230620-3

EPub Edition June 2016 ISBN 9780062306227
Version 10112019

16 17 18 19 20 OPM 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

FIRST EDITION

My name is Professor A.J. and I know everything there is to know about geography.

Geography is cool. Do you know why? Because its all about exploding volcanoes that shoot red-hot lava up in the air, and earthquakes that swallow cars, and tornadoes that pick up cows and fling them across the highway, and hurricanes that rip trees out of the ground, and all kinds of cool stuff like that.

Now, just wait a minute there, Arlo!

Oh no! Its Andrea Young, this annoying girl in my class with curly brown hair. She calls me by my real name because she knows I dont like it.

Yes, my name is Andrea, and I know a lot about geography too. Because Im in the gifted and talented program at school.

But geography isnt just about natural disasters. Geographers explore and describe the earth and the people on it. They try to explain where things are, why theyre there, how they change over time, and what all that has to do with the humans who live there. Geography is about our planet, the continents, and lakes, and rivers

Zzzzzzzzz. Oh, sorry! I dozed off there for a minute. I couldnt help it, because Andrea is so boring.

But geography isnt boring. Did you know that more than two-thirds of the earths surface is made out of Jell-O? Did you know that when you reach the very top of Mount Everest, theres a McDonalds? Did you know that in Antarctica all the toilet bowls are upside down?

Arlo, you made all that up, and everybody knows it!

Well, yeah. But I do know a lot of true stuff about geography too. True weird stuff. Do you want to know what it is?

Well, Im not going to tell you.

Okay, okay, Ill tell you. Theres just one thing you have to do.

Turn the page.

Go ahead! Turn it! Its not like Im going to turn it for you. Im inside the book!

Yours truly,

Professor A.J.

(the professor of awesomeness)

Andrea Young (Im going to Harvard someday.)

I can handle the second part of this question. The answer is nobody. Thats who cares about geography.

Okay, can we move on to the cool stuff, like exploding volcanoes and tornadoes that pick up cows and fling them across the highway? Thats what Id want to read about.

No, Arlo! Geography is really important! Why dont you go sit down over there and play with your little video games while I explain geography to the people?

Sure! I love playing video games.

(Dont tell Andrea, but its okay for you to skip this part of the book and go straight to the chapter about exploding volcanoes and flying cows.)