When a rare coin and a strange code are uncovered in McKenna School, Malcolm and the other classroom pets of the Midnight Academy take on their most challenging assignment yet and, through their investigations, they just might save the school from closing.
Thirteen-year-old Drew starts the summer of 1986 helping in her mother's cheese shop and dreaming about co-worker Nick, but when her widowed mother begins dating, Drew's father's book of lists, her pet rat, and Emmett, a boy on a quest, help her cope.
Malcolm, a smaller than average rat, loves life at McKenna School and the secret society of classroom pets that keep children out of trouble, but when Aggy the iguana disappears Malcolm must use all of his ratty persistence to prove his innocence and save her.
Tyler is a bully who enjoys frightening other students, but when his only friend, his class's pet rat, gets out of her cage he needs the help of a human friend, and fast.
Alice Evelyn Davis, seventeen, has generally gotten all she wants from life but when her college of choice rejects her, problems with her best friend arise, and she faces an unexpected loss, her new-found interest in running helps get her through.