Most students arrive at a new school wondering who they’ll sit with at lunch or whether they’ll fit in. For Oliver Winters, those concerns become considerably stranger when his new classmates turn out to be aspiring thieves, criminal prodigies, and young technical masterminds.
Author Matt Jordan-Pummell explores that imaginative setup in Heist Jr. High: The Waywards, his debut novel and the first entry in the Heist Jr. High middle-grade series. Scheduled for release on October 1, the story brings together friendship, humor, high-stakes school challenges, and the irresistible excitement of planning a heist.
An Ordinary Kid Enters an Extraordinary School
At 12 years old, Oliver has already seen more of the world than many adults. His documentary-filmmaker parents travel extensively for their work, and he has spent his childhood accompanying them from one production location to another.
His unconventional upbringing comes with a tradeoff. Oliver has always been homeschooled, leaving him with little experience interacting with children his own age.
When his parents accept a filmmaking assignment at an active volcano site, they decide Oliver needs somewhere safer to stay. Horizon Junior High, a boarding school in New York, appears to provide the answer.
Once his parents leave, Oliver begins discovering what Horizon actually teaches.
The school is a secret training facility for exceptionally talented young criminals. Its students possess abilities ranging from lock-picking and technology to mechanics and deception. They’re being trained to sharpen those talents and eventually carry out sophisticated heists.
Oliver possesses none of those skills.
He has never cracked a safe or picked a lock. Computers aren’t his specialty, and hotwiring vehicles certainly wasn’t included in his homeschooling curriculum. Suddenly, a boy already learning how to socialize must also figure out how to survive Horizon’s demanding elimination system.
Five Students Find Their Place as The Waywards
Survival at Horizon requires Oliver to build a crew, bringing several memorable personalities into his rapidly changing world.
His roommate Jaden is an expert lock-picker who is deaf. Oliver knows American Sign Language, giving them a natural connection and helping establish a friendship within an environment that initially feels completely unfamiliar.
Lilly brings serious technological ability to the group. She comes from a family with an unusual reputation, as her parents are considered evil geniuses. Their remarkable intellect has clearly carried into the next generation.
Sonja specializes in disguise, although her approach gives the familiar skill a wonderfully quirky direction. Her disguises are inanimate objects. Away from her disguises, she’s energetic and exceptionally talkative, adding another distinctive personality to the crew.
Mo handles mechanics and serves as the group’s getaway driver. There’s a hilarious catch to that impressive title: he has never driven a car.
These four students join Oliver to form The Waywards. Every member seems to have an identifiable purpose. Oliver still has to discover his.
That uncertainty creates one of the book’s most intriguing questions. In a school where everyone is defined by an exceptional ability, perhaps Oliver’s contribution will come from something he hasn’t recognized yet.
Turning a Personal Reading Experience Into an Adventure
For Matt, writing middle-grade fiction carries particular significance. He remembers middle grade as the point when he personally stopped reading, only returning to books during his later high-school years.
His goal is to create the kind of page-turning experience that could help young readers avoid that same gap.
The Waywards marks Matt’s first journey into middle-grade fiction following approximately eight years of writing comic books. That background fits naturally with a concept filled with colorful characters, specialized abilities, secret environments, and scenes that invite visual imagination.
The criminal-school setting also gives the series room to grow. Horizon can introduce new challenges and personalities while The Waywards develop their abilities, relationships, and identities as a crew.
At the center remains Oliver, whose apparent normality may become one of the story’s most valuable ingredients.
About Author Matt Jordan-Pummell
Originally from New York, Matt now lives in Portland, Oregon, with his wife Cam and their two children, Reed and Elliot. The family shares its home with Moose, their dog, and cats Bennie and Jet.
Matt works in Sales Operations at On-Running and is Co-founder of the Desklands. A self-described geek, he enjoys exploring niche interests, creative ideas, and the kind of enthusiastic conversations that can turn an interesting thought into something bigger.
Readers who pre-order Heist Jr. High can send a photograph of their receipt along with their mailing address to thedesklands@gmail.com. Matt will send participating readers a signed thank-you card.
The Heist Is Just Getting Started
Heist Jr. High: The Waywards gives young readers an unusual school to explore and five very different students to follow as they learn to operate together.
When the book arrives October 1, Oliver’s first challenge will involve far more than surviving a new school. He’ll need to prove that even among criminal prodigies, there’s room on the crew for someone still discovering what makes him special.
