QI really wish books could come with trigger warnings. I can read books and deal with the death of humans but I just cannot read books in which an animal dies.
As difficult as this book was for me at the end, I still found the majority of it to be fun. The science aspect of this story and the awkward young teenagers is quite enjoyable!

Another fantastic book by Holm! She is a favorite in my classroom and my middle-school students and I love her work. At first, I was a bit concerned about the romance aspect of it, but I should not have worried, Holm understands what her readers want.

Another great read by Holm! I think this one will appeal to a certain audience. It won't connect with her Babymouse crowd, but it will work great for her fiction readers!

The perfect blend of science and heart! I loved this! Great characters, some fun surprises, and a happy ending. Perfect. I don't think you have to read these in order to enjoy them, but both books are excellent. Highly recommend.

This delightful follow-up to "The Fourteenth Goldfish" continues with Ellie's grandfather, Melvin, making his comeback in his 14 year old boy body. Together, they team up to enter the science fair and continue the pursuit of everlasting youth. Ellie's chess-playing friend, who, perhaps, might be more than a friend, is featured in the book, along with others from before.
You don't have to read the first book in order to enjoy the second. They stand independently on their own but are enhanced when you spot them from before. Holm is such an accomplished author beginning with her "Baby Mouse" collection which is always a hit. "The Third Mushroom" is sure to follow in their footsteps.

This is the fun follow up to the first book in this series, the 14th Goldfish, although it is totally not necessary to have read the first one.

Ellie’s grandfather got turned into a 14 year old boy, in the first book, and so that is where we pick up again.

Set in the San Francisco Bay Area, Ellie takes after her grandfather in her interest in science. Her best friend is a chess geek, and she loves her cat.

Typical middle school stuff, with a bit of science (magic like science), thrown in. There is a hint of romance, but only a hint, which is good.

There is a great quote, that sort of sums up the feel of this book.

<blockquote>I definitely believe in science, like my grandfather does. But a small part of me is curious about magic.

Because cats.

There has to be something magical involved with creating them. The fluffy tails, the way they snuggle into loaf shapes and sleep in the sun. Most of all the purring.</blockquote>

Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review.

Loved this book just as much as the last one. My students are currently obsessed with axolotls, so I was so happy to find this book! Love the idea of a discovery that regerates lost body parts. A great sci-fi read for middle grades.

I am on "Team Mellie!" Ellie and Melvin are back and their second adventure is every bit as exciting and humorous as their first. Ellie claims, "If Shakespeare wrote a play about me, it would be a tragedy." With a grandfather stuck in the body of a teenager and a best friend testing the relationship waters, it surely would seem so.

Ellie's journey helps her to see that failure is okay. Experimentation is important in science AND in life. Jennifer Holm leaves us with a great author's note - be adventurous, try new things, always look for the unexpected.

Jennifer Holm is always a delight! I have been waiting for this book ever since The Fourteenth Goldfish came out. Melvin is the hilarious grandpa we all wish we had. Third Mushroom puts you right back into the world of Fourteenth Goldfish, and I never wanted to leave!

I think I enjoyed this follow up to Fourteenth Goldfish even more than the first. Ellie is still trying to make her way through middle school, struggling with friendship and romance and coursework. But her situation is complicated by her grandfather, who has to pretend to be a schoolmate. They team up on a science project and Ellie learns many lessons, about science and life.

Lots of interesting science-y backmatter, too!

This was such a great addition to Melvin and Ellie's story. I fell right back in with their characters and I loved being back with them. Melvin is such a great character and I enjoyed seeing Ellie grow. This book dealt with loss very well. The scientific elements of the books were so well done and interesting. I definitely love the way Holm crafts a story that is so perfectly catered to her audience. I highly recommend this book.

Somehow I had forgotten that I had read The Fourteenth Goldfish a few years ago, so it was a pleasant surprise when I began reading the Third Mushroom to recognize Ellie, Raj, and her grandfather! This was a really great sequel that tied everything together in the end. While Ellie encountered many struggles, she pushed through them with perseverance and grace. Without spoiling anything, there was one extremely heart wrenching part that I connected with on a personal level, and I thought Jennifer Hill did an amazing job of writing about Ellie’s struggle to navigate through such a difficult time. It felt very realistic and relatable. This book seemed to have a bit of a more somber tone than the first, but there were still plenty of silly moments intertwined as well. I know that many of my students will be excited to read this follow up to the Fourteenth Goldfish! Thank you, NetGalley for the ARC!

I loved The Fourteenth Goldfish with its zany characters and love for science, so when I saw this sequel, The Third Mushroom, I pretty much HAD to read it. Ellie’s grandpa still cracked me up with his goofy blend of grandpa-slash-teenage-boy-ness. I loved the way he referred to hormonal issues as “The Puberty” and his cute relationship with the librarian.

There’s one part (I don’t want to give away what happens) that’s super sad. I wasn’t prepared for it, and it brought back the memories of my own similar experience. Those scenes were tough to read because they were so moving, but overall, there’s a positive message through it. (I’ll add a spoiler section to the end since it might be something you’d want to know about before reading if you’ve got a sensitive kid who’s just been through what Ellie’s experience.)
I also liked the way the story addressed the shifting relationships Ellie experiences. I so remember that stuff happening in middle school and how disconcerting it could be.

Science again plays a fun and interesting role in the story, as Ellie and her grandfather enter a science fair together and learn about various scientists who’ve made important contributions in the past. The end of the book includes a short list of resources to learn more about the scientists and discoveries mentioned in the book, which I thought was a nice touch as well.

Overall, if you enjoy spunky, fun stories, The Third Mushroom is a great pick.

What a great book! I’m so happy I was given an advance copy—now I know I can use it for my Mock Newbery book club.

The characters were so enjoyable—I giggled so many times and know my students will enjoy them as well! I also like that this book didn’t have the main character going “boy crazy”; instead she was focused on science. Science with girls is such an under-written about topic; this book is so important to keep the conversations about girls in science moving forward.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher, Random House, for the opportunity! I’m so excited to see this one in my classroom.

Jennifer Holm creates the sequel to the Fourteenth Goldfish and she has written a great middle school read! Ellie’s grandfather is a famous scientist who has been able to reverse the aging process. As a result, grandpa is now attending the same middle school as Ellie. This helps Ellie because working with a scientist with two degrees can’t hurt! Or can it? As a former science teacher, it is wonderful to see science fair play a role in this story. And with a female character exploring science is even better! You might like to read the Fourteenth Goldfish first but it is not necessary to follow and enjoy this story.

Ellie’s grandpa Melvin just moved back in with her family. But the strange thing about grandpa Melvin, who is a world-renowned scientist, is that he discovered a way to reverse-age himself. While grandpa Melvin is incredibly smart and has two PhDs, he’s in the body of a smelly-footed 14 year old boy who now attends the same middle school as his granddaughter Ellie.

Ellie decides to team up with her grandpa for the science fair and their project is nothing short of stunning – a possible formula for the fountain of youth. When Ellie’s beloved cat gets sick, Ellie becomes even more desperate to see how far their experiment can go.

Though The Third Mushroom is the sequel to The Fourteenth Goldish (another great read!) this book still stands on its own. With interesting characters and a touch of middle school romance middle grade readers will devour it!

I had the opportunity to read a NetGalley digital ARC of this middle grade science fiction novel. I really enjoyed read The Fourteenth Goldfish several years ago, and so I was eager to get my hands on this sequel. In the first book, eleven-year-old Ellie is dealing with all of the changes in her social and academic life that come with adolescence when she discovers that her grandfather has somehow transformed himself into a teenage boy.
In this follow-up novel, Melvin (her teenage grandfather) has returned to the Bay area to live with Ellie’s family. Attending middle school as her cousin, Melvin is able to get back into the science lab to do his own research while helping Ellie with her science fair project. Ellie needs extra credit in science and having a lab partner who also has two PhDs will certainly help. In addition to the science fair project, Ellie is also experimenting in other areas of her life: dating a person vs just being friends, rekindling friendships from the past, and whether she can ever learn to like mushrooms.
This is a fun book to read and I think it will appeal to middle grade students who are starting to notice similar changes in their own lives. The book digs deeper into Ellie’s relationship with her grandfather, which has become closer since they’ve been spending this time together as teenagers. I like that she gets this different perspective into his life and feelings. There are some cute moments, though, as the age difference shows itself in their tastes in music, cars, and modern technology.
And, as before, I think it’s great to have a female main character that is interested in science. She also has a friend who is on the school’s chess team. This book has a lot of good messages without being too heavy for young readers.

Life isn't a Hollywood movie. That's one of the many things that Ellie learns in The Third Mushroom, an incredibly satisfying sequel to The Fourteenth Goldfish. In this book, which I finished in under 24 hours, we watch as Ellie experiments with her first romantic relationship, works on a science fair project with her grandfather, and realizes that having someone who shares memories with you is important. It is useful to have read The Fourteenth Goldfish, but it can be read without that background knowledge.


Ellie's grandfather, Melvin, is a scientist with 2 PhD's and appears to be about 14 even though he is really in his 70s. After The Fourteenth Goldfish, Melvin had decided to travel, but has tired of it. He slips easily back into his life with Ellie and her mom, but a little less easily into middle school. His being back does help Ellie enter the science fair though. After looking at a specimen of Melvin's that turns out to be an axolotl with extra legs, they grow fruit flies to see if something in the axolotl causes the growth. When they see their experiment starting to work, Melvin also injects himself with some of the axolotl in the hopes to grow back a tooth. Of course it doesn't do that, but there are other consequences.


At the same time, the Third Mushroom is very much about friendship. Ellie is having to navigate the waters of the possibility that her relationship with her best friend, Raj, might be turning into something more, and she isn't sure how she feels about that. The awkwardness of that possible change pushes her back into a friendship with Brianna, who used to be her best friend until they hit 6th grade and everything changed. Ellie realizes how nice it is to have memories with someone. Even Melvin learns how vital it is to be able to have someone to share memories with, even if they are just general memories of the way things were when he was a teenager.


Jennifer L. Holm did it again with this book. The Third Mushroom is a great book that takes on interesting topics, even scientific ones. Anyone who enjoyed the Fourteenth Goldfish will definitely want to pick this one up as well.

This is a sequel to the Fourteenth Goldfish and it picks up with the same characters. If you haven't read the first one, you might be a little confused, but it won't last long because Holm's storytelling is so good. The story is about Ellie who lives with her mom (and now her stepdad). Ellie is navigating the perils of middle school-terrible food, stinky gym clothes, friendships that may or may not be romances, and friends that used to be friends and might be again. Her grandfather turns up (he's still a grumpy old man in the body of a 14 year old boy) and they decide to do a science fair project together. It has really wonderful themes of friendship (and how they change), romance, and the awesomeness of science. Jennifer Holm has such an excellent voice for middle grade kids. This will be a great addition to our library!

I really loved The Fourteenth Goldfish and recommended/got it for others to read. When I learned there'd be another in the series, I was really excited!

And I liked it! But, not as much as The Fourteenth Goldfish.

I liked the overall direction, the Raj and Ellie question was inevitable but I wish she didn't address it and just kept it ambiguous like in the previous book.