Mr. Lemoncello and the Titanium Ticket: Prologue–Chapter 8

by Chris Grabenstein
In this fifth book of the series Mr. Lemoncello's Library Olympics, middle schoolers compete for admission into the Ohioan billionaire game inventor's top-secret new building, which holds four tickets to a competition for a grand prize.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Prologue–Chapter 8, Chapters 9–20, Chapters 21–38, Chapters 39–58
35 words 8 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. cryptic
    having a secret or hidden meaning
    Tonight, they’d spent two hours running around inside a mysterious world of puzzles, games, and holographic surprises—piecing together a cryptic message on a tablet computer.
  2. corresponding
    similar especially in position or purpose
    Kyle tapped in Akimi’s answer. The letters in the numbered bubbles automatically appeared in the corresponding numbered spaces in the phrase that Kyle and Akimi had been slowly piecing together as they worked their way through eight different game stations.
  3. counter
    speak in response
    “‘E’ used to be a vowel!” Akimi shouted back. “Until you made me turn it into an ‘H’!”
    “You’re the one who did that!” countered Kyle.
  4. toll
    ring slowly
    Off in the distance, clock chimes played their hourly melody and started tolling.
  5. sprawling
    spreading out in different directions
    For twenty-five years, Luigi L. Lemoncello, the world-famous game maker, had manufactured his games inside the fantastical castle fortress of the Lemoncello Gameworks—a sprawling factory perched high on a hilltop overlooking the Hudson River.
  6. pinnacle
    a slender upright spire at the top of a buttress or a tower
    The pinnacles at their pointy tips were topped with cello weather vanes.
  7. concentric
    having a common center
    Plywood down, the secret glass building was now surrounded by three rings of chain-link fences, set up in concentric circles.
  8. insatiable
    impossible to fulfill, appease, or gratify
    Besides, Simon had what his grandmother called “an insatiable curiosity.” He loved tearing things apart just to see how they worked. And then he loved putting them back together.
  9. char
    burn slightly and superficially so as to affect color
    It took a week for the bathroom not to smell like a charred wig.
  10. mangy
    worn or threadbare
    Maybe Luigi L. Lemoncello was just a madman with a mangy mustache.
  11. clobber
    strike violently and repeatedly
    The hurling machine had clobbered Simon with some kind of flying beef potpie loaded with gravy, potatoes, and slimy meat chunks.
  12. patent
    obtain a document granting sole rights to an invention
    Thanks to Mr. Lemoncello’s patented smell-a-vision indoor air fresheners, the whole house smelled like gingersnaps.
  13. surveil
    keep under close watch or observation
    In addition to a regular TV, the McClintocks had a special room filled with five dozen small video monitors—one for each security camera surveilling the Gameworks Factory and grounds.
  14. personnel
    group of people willing to obey orders
    “Scramble, scramble!” Jack’s father hollered up the staircase. “We need to be Oscar Mike!”
    Security personnel everywhere knew that meant “on the move.”
  15. tactical
    pertaining to detailed maneuvers to achieve objectives
    Jack rolled away from his homework desk and plucked his tactical jacket off the back of his chair.
  16. interloper
    someone who intrudes on the privacy or property of another
    “Intruder alert?” he shouted down the steps.
    “Roger that!” his dad hollered back. “Interloper at the gates. Grab your moonbeam.”
  17. skeptical
    marked by or given to doubt
    “He’s a dummy?” asked Mr. McClintock, arching a skeptical eyebrow. “Then how’d he make it through the first two gates and successfully complete the riddles for the third?”
  18. drab
    of a light brownish green color
    Jack was wearing a green, brown, and tan camouflage T-shirt and olive- drab cargo pants.
  19. improvise
    manage in a makeshift way; do with whatever is at hand
    The wheel would turn thanks to a motor Simon had improvised out of Circuit Cubes.
  20. pneumatic
    relating to or using air or a similar gas
    There was a pneumatic tube elevator that shot action-figure passengers straddling a Ping-Pong ball up to the top of the Ferris wheel.
  21. straddle
    sit or stand astride of
    There was a pneumatic tube elevator that shot action-figure passengers straddling a Ping-Pong ball up to the top of the Ferris wheel.
  22. tinker
    do random, unplanned work or activities; spend time idly
    When he was your age, he used to go to his local public library, where the librarian would let him tinker with his ideas. She even lent him things out of her desk drawer, like a Barbie doll boot.
  23. carrel
    small individual study area in a library
    Mrs. Merkle bustled off to see what all the noise and commotion was on the other side of the carrels separating the maker space from the rest of the library.
  24. oblivious
    lacking conscious awareness of
    Jack remained oblivious. He was wearing noise-reducing headphones, too.
  25. trudge
    walk heavily and firmly, as when weary, or through mud
    After school, Simon trudged up the front porch steps of his grandparents’ two-story frame house on Oak Street.
  26. cog
    tooth on the rim of gear wheel
    It was basically a little red wagon that Simon had repurposed with grooved cog wheels that could roll on slanted rails elevated over the stoop’s five steps.
  27. dormer
    a gabled extension built out from a sloping roof
    Simon had the whole attic to himself, including a dirt-streaked circular window tucked into an angled dormer.
  28. swagger
    walk with a lofty proud gait
    Jack McClintock swaggered into the science lab with a bunch of his friends.
  29. scrawl
    write carelessly
    Simon ducked his head and circled the too funny for words he’d scrawled on his doodle sheet.
  30. osmosis
    the gradual and unconscious absorption of knowledge or ideas
    “Thanks. It’s because I live out at the factory. I just sort of soak the answers into my brain through mental osmosis.”
  31. practical
    concerned with actual use
    “Yep. We’re both puzzle solvers. I like the intellectual kind. You’re more practical. You build stuff.”
  32. hypothesis
    a tentative insight that is not yet verified or tested
    I have a few hypotheses but I need to gather more data before I reach a conclusion.
  33. plume
    anything that resembles a feather in shape or lightness
    As the bus pulled closer to the factory, colored plumes of smoke shot up, creating a daytime fireworks display.
  34. turret
    a small tower extending above a building
    The cellos atop the lemony turrets bowed themselves and played a beautiful melody that Simon recognized.
  35. intricate
    having many complexly arranged elements; elaborate
    At the far end of the bridge, which spanned the ball-pit moat, a jolly man in a bright-yellow jumpsuit and a hard hat resembling half a lemon stepped through the factory’s twenty-foot-tall front doors that had been intricately carved to resemble two sideways labyrinths.
Created on Thu Mar 09 17:02:20 EST 2023 (updated Wed Mar 15 09:27:26 EDT 2023)

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