Sugar Cube City

By Brooklyn West

It's late fall, and the Pick-Your-Own Apple Festival is coming to an end. The sugar cube projects created by local businesses and schools will be around for just one more night. Libby and her friends plan to visit all their favorites. But plans quickly change. Libby's grandfather puts her in charge of loading the family van with sugar cubes for the winter storehouse. And Luna's anti-gravity belt is malfunctioning sending her packing for an intergalactic trip to her home world. Libby wonders whether she'll ever see her friend Luna again. Libby puts off loading the van to find useful items for Luna's long journey. Then raccoons attack the sugar cube projects, and the farmer ships everything to the dump a day early. Libby hasn't loaded a single sugar cube for the store house, and Fern is swept up into the garbage truck with the one thing that might keep Luna from leaving the orchard.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brooklyn West
• Release date: Dec 25, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005456382

Brooklyn West

Meet Libby LacewingMy name is Libby, and I'm a lacewing bug. I live on an apple orchard nestled in the Midwest where I help my family remove apple-harming, sap-sucking pests from the apple trees. Especially, aphids. Aphids are small bugs that steal nutrients from the apple buds causing them to turn brown and wither. My family and I round up the aphids and herd them to the roots.

Book preview

Sugar Cube City

By Brooklyn West

Illustrations by

Rue Moon

Watercolor by

Bill Day

Copyright 2021, 2024 by Brooklyn West

All rights in this book are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Table of Contents

Meet Libby Lacewing

Meet Fern the Stinkbug

Meet Luna

Chapter 1: Winter Stock

Chapter 2: Sugar Cube City

Chapter 3: Raccoons Attack!

Chapter 4: The Dump

Chapter 5: Cinnamon Heart Trail

Chapter 6: Queen of the Cockroaches

Chapter 7: A Petri Dish Apple

Chapter 8: Polka Dot Cockroaches

Chapter 9: Inside the Meteorite

Meet Libby Lacewing

My name is Libby, and I'm a lacewing bug. I live on an apple orchard nestled in the Midwest where I help my family remove apple-harming, sap-sucking pests from the apple trees. Especially, aphids. Aphids are small bugs that steal nutrients from the apple buds causing them to turn brown and wither. My family and I round up the aphids and herd them to the roots.

Meet Fern the Stinkbug

I know what you're going to say, But stinkbugs are pests. They eat apples, cause damage, and leave corky brown spots. Good. You've been paying attention. True, but Fern is different than most stinkbugs. She's our friend. She landed in the orchard after a storm blew her away from her family. Fern has promised never to eat the apples, and she's been true to her word. Instead she eats pollen pancakes. Lots of them. She's almost always in costume. Usually a beetle costume. We don't want anyone calling in a stinkbug invasion.

Meet Luna

We call her Luna because she has a moon-like glow. Her real name is x6lnfg. You try pronouncing that. She lives in a meteorite in the garden. The farmer’s wife found the odd-looking rock during a trip through Arizona. I haven’t been too deep inside the meteorite – there’s a strange mist that hovers around it. According to Luna, there’s a whole alien world in there with glowing waters and luminescent forests.

Chapter 1: Winter Stock

Libby, I've parked the aphid van by the barn under the old wagon wheel, said Libby's grandfather. When you're done filling it with sugar cubes, let me know. I'll drive it back to the tree.

Can't Lars do it? asked Libby. It's the last night of Sugar Cube City.

Exactly, said Libby’s grandfather. And we need to stockpile as many of those sugar cubes as we can in the storehouse. Winter is coming.

But I promised to meet Luna and Fern, said Libby.

It won't take all night,