This is the story of Ricky Ricotta, a lonely little mouse who befriends a giant robot, takes on the school bullies, and saves the city from an evil rat scientist named Dr. Stinky McNasty! With Flip-O-Rama action scenes, and a cool How-To Draw section!

When Dav Pilkey was a kid, there was a cool T.V. show on every Saturday called "Super Host". It featured a bumbling, red-nosed guy dressed in a baggy "Superman" outfit, who would do silly skits and show old monster movies all afternoon. Dav usually watched Super Host every Saturday, and his favorite thing was when "Supe" showed old Japanese monster movies. "I loved seeing the giant monsters crashing through cities, with all the little people below running and screaming. It always looked kinda fake, but I still loved it. Now that I'm older, I collect those movies on video, and I still love watching them." — Dav Pilkey Dav wanted to create a series of children's books based on the "Giant Monster" theme, so he wrote a book called "Ricky Ricotta's Giant Robot". He made several sketches of the main characters, and the new series was accepted at Scholastic...where it sat on the shelf for almost two years. "I really wanted to illustrate these books myself, but I knew that I wasn't right for the job. The books needed bold, strong linework, and a comic book sense of action and perspective. That style of illustrating just doesn't come naturally to me." — Dav Pilkey Then one day, Dav walked into an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon. There on the walls were some of the coolest paintings that Dav had ever seen. The paintings were by a guy named Martin Ontiveros, and they all featured giant robots, monsters, and space monkeys. Dav gave Martin a call and asked him if he'd like to work together on some books. Martin had never illustrated a children's book before, but he was willing to give it a try. Dav had already designed Ricky, his parents, and the Giant Robot, so he turned his designs over to Martin. Martin re-drew these characters with his wonderful broad, bold lines and then began designing all the supporting characters and bad guys (including Dr. Stinky McNasty). Dav then showed Martin's artwork to his editor at Scholastic, who knew a good thing when she saw it. Soon, Martin was signed up to illustrate the series, and was hard at work on the first book. "I expected to have to work very closely with Martin on the first book until he got the hang of things. But he surprised me by already having 'the hang of things'. His first draft of the book was nearly perfect! Not only is Martin a 'natural' at book illustration, but he also turned out to be a swell guy and a good friend, too." — Dav Pilkey

1. Dav's favorite monster movie of all time is "Godzilla Vs. Megalon". Please run out and rent a copy of it as soon as possible— but be forewarned: it's REALLY stupid! 2. The potion that Dr. Stinky uses to turn the classroom lizard into a monster is called Hate Potion #9. This is a silly take-off of an old rock song called "Love Potion #9" made popular by The Clovers. 3. This book was originally published as "Ricky Ricotta's Giant Robot." We stopped using the word "Giant" in the year 2002 after many young fans pointed out that the Robot really isn't a 'giant'. He's just 12 times taller than a mouse, so he's really only about two-and-a-half feet tall. Many young readers suggested the adjective "Mighty" instead, so after careful consideration, we changed the title on all the books. We like to keep our readers happy! 4. If you have a copy of the old title (Ricky Ricotta's Giant Robot), hang on to it. The books will never be printed that way again, so your copy will be very rare and valuable some day!

• Ricky Ricotta's Mighty Robot Vs. The Stupid Stinkbugs from Saturn