There was too much math in this for me. The radius of a circle, degrees, yikes! Math was never my strong suit.

The latest installment of the Secret Coder series (the fifth in a series of graphic novels) provides readers with some back matter to coding and the series' storyline. The ending; follows its predecessors, leaving readers with a problem, setting up the next book in the series.
The graphic novel Potions and Parameters begins by sharing how to solve the coding problem left in Robots and Repeats. Our three main characters Hopper, Eni and Josh, with Professor Bee, still are trying to stop Professor One-Zero from releasing his evil controlling potion to the world. Professor Bee shares some history of Flatland and how Seymour Papert, Cynthia Solomon and Wally Feurzeig developed the LOGO coding language. With this new knowledge, the trio has instructions on how to return to his homeland to retrieve an item that may ultimately stop Professor One-Zero.

The strength of this series is the sequential building of coding skills. Readers receive problems woven into the plot to solve that build upon their skills as coders and allow them to gain confidence. The step by step sharing gives readers a chance to get assistance, stop reading and still solve the remaining portion of the problem. A popular series to introduce coding to younger readers in a different format that is educational and engaging.

This series is very charming, but each book does rely heavily on the plot of the previous in the series, as the plot runs through the whole series rather than each title having it's own plot as happens in some juvenile books.

That being said, I think these present coding concepts very well, while also addressing things like friendship and how to resolve conflict.

Start with the first book or you will be lost! If read in order, this book can get students interested in coding and the logic necessary for coding. These must be read in the correct order, though.

My students love this series!

Three friends try to stop an evil professor from poisoning their town by using their coding skills.

Full disclosure: I requested this book on NetGalley because I’ve read other Gene Luen Yang books and enjoyed them (American Born Chinese, Boxers & Saints). I want to learn more about the basics of coding, and I figured a graphic novel about coding by a great author would be a good way to dive in. I didn’t realize that this book is fifth in a series… and that you REALLY need to read all of the books in order for this one to make any sense. Had I read all previous books, I’m pretty sure my rating would be higher. That said, I also shouldn’t have requested an ARC because this version was missing some artwork… CODING artwork that was pretty essential to learning anything about coding from the book. I did get the sense from it that, if you read the whole series, you’d get coding practice AND an interesting plot with characters you grow to care about. (But I didn’t read them. So… I’m kind of left with a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ on this one.) MG. Graphic Novel.

Full confession: I do not have a coder's brain. But I am so, so glad that series like this exist to help teach kids from an early age how to embrace this language in a fun and engaging way. And Flatland! Yay!

Hopper, Eni, and Josh continue their efforts to take down Dr. One-Zero before he can control the entire town. And that is just what he plans to do with his "green pop." He has the students creating gallons of the stuff during their chemistry classes, and readers already know from previous books that drinking the soda can hypnotize people into what the villain calls "true happiness." How does he plan to use this stockpile to take over everyone in town?

When the Coders use the Turtle of Light, the most powerful programming tool that Professor Bee has, they manage to find Hopper's missing father and some of the professor's other students. But while they are preoccupied, One-Zero gets his hands on the Turtle. With Eni's parents threatening to transfer him to another school (because Hopper and Josh are bad influences), Hopper's mother worried about her safety and distracted by the health of her newly rescued husband, can the Coders stay together long enough to put an end to One-Zero and his plans for good?

Like the other Secret Coders books, Potions and Parameters has plenty of explanations of coding concepts as Professor Bee teaches the Coders the skills they need to fight the villain. And there are pauses so that readers can work out the coding challenges themselves. For middle graders who enjoy graphic novels and have an interest in robots and coding, this is the perfect series.

Highly recommended for elementary school libraries and classrooms.

This is a cute quick read. The colors distracted me from the content. As a graphic novel color does matter.

The coding keeps getting more advanced, and the storyline keeps getting crazier! What will happen next? In this volume, they rescue Hopper's dad (yay!), thwart One-Zero multiple times as usual (yay!), and some start to realize they may have more-than-friends feelings for each other (which I could have done without. Do we really have to go down this path with every boy-girl friendship in books? Sometimes they're just friends! Let's focus on the coding and adventures!)

As always, I found it too short and I do hope one day these are all published together in one volume. Or maybe I'm just impatient since I have to wait for each one to be published!

Review that will be posted on GoodReads Mar 13:

The Secret Coders use LightLight and their growing coding skills to help them hunt for Hopper's dad, but things don't go as planned and it is revealed that Dr. One-Zero has something even more evil in the works for the entire town.

Several big things happen in this one. The situation is getting more serious. Big secrets get revealed. The secret Professor Bee reveals was probably the most interesting (and unexpected). And everyone will be withering away waiting for Secret Coders #6 to come out. Sorry, can't tell much more than that without some big spoilers. This series is so good in helping readers learn coding basics in a very fun way. Things covered in previous books get resurfaced or built upon so you don't forget what you've already learned, and constant progress is being made in knowledge. How to code circles gets introduced in this one, as well as how to code any polygon.

No content issues.

I received an ecopy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Secret Coders continues! This one started off a little dull, I felt, and finished a bit bizarrely. But parts in the middle were really fun, and I love the development of the characters and the relationships they have with others. I do feel a little like these books are trying to cram a little too much into each story, but somehow it is still working. As I am not really the intended audience, I think take my review with a pinch of salt, but having said that I still think these books would be great for kids interested in coding.

While we're talking about robots and programming, there's a new volume of Secret Coders coming at you. The fifth installment of the series sees Hopper, Eni, and Josh going up against Professor One-Zero and his evil Green Pop. The stakes are high, especially now that Hopper's dad's fate lies in the balance! We get a lot more of Professor Bee's origin, and the fight for the mystical Turtle of Light will keep you turning pages. Yang and Holmes challenge readers with more logic puzzles and codes to work through, and provide detailed explanation through their characters.

Gene Luen Yang can do no wrong in my eyes - this is such a fun series and it seems to have found a niche with both male and female readers. Can't wait for more.

Not as wonderful as the rest of the series =( I feel like something was lacking in this one

Meet the Secret Coders, three middle school students who use computer coding skills to combat crime. In addition to the good versus evil plotline, a few interesting coding puzzles are included. As with many series of books, the reader might be a bit lost if previous books in the series have not been read, but if read from the first book in the series, middle grade readers who are interested in coding might find this series appealing.

I would suggest to students to read this series in order, as it is a bit confusing as a stand alone novel.

I really love these kids and their adventures in coding! I am so excited to share this new book with my students!

I had high expectations for this book, as I have loved all of Gene Luen Yang’s past books (at least those I’ve read). Sadly, I was let down a little. Having never heard of this series before, I did not expect this to be the 5th book in the series and went into the story thinking it was a stand-alone. That being said, this novel does not work as a stand-alone book. The story picks up in the middle of a conflict making it hard for new readers to jump into the plot.

That being said, I enjoy the concept of this book. It is a very effective way to teach rudimentary programming skills. In this book alone, the reader learns how to code basic polygons that could be used to program a path for an object.

The book does have an interesting cast of characters, where the evil villain kind of reminds me of Dr. Doofenshmirtz from Phineas and Ferb, and the trio of main characters reminds me of the trio from Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide.

Overall this was a decent graphic novel, but not a series I will go back to in the future.

Another great entry in the series! If I were a kid, these would be my absolute favorite thing. I would be obsessed. These books are a fantastic way to introduce the ideas of programming to anyone - not just kids!