The Aliens for Breakfast Trilogy, is a short, easy chapter book series for elementary school children about a boy named Richard Bickerstaff and his adventures with a small alien named Aric. Aric is a commander of the Interspace Brigade, and they operate on a shoestring budget, so they often transport Aric to Earth in some form of food to save money. He shows up at Richard’s house in each book in some kind of free sample or as part of a takeout meal.

The books are humorous science-fiction stories. Aric shows up at Richard’s house to recruit him to fight other aliens and save Earth from various threats, but because of the strange methods of travel the brigade makes him ensure, he often finds his memory muddled about how to deal with each threat. Richard has to help Aric remember what to do or figure it out through experimentation. Sometimes, Richard’s best friend, Henry, joins them. There is always some humorous solution to the problem.

Richard is a fan of science fiction and comic books himself, and there are references in the stories to popular sci-fi comics and movies. Some of them really exist, like Star Trek, Star Wars, and X-Men, but there are also some that were just made up for the books.

The series is by Stephanie Spinner and Jonathan Etra.

Books in the Series:

Aliens for Breakfast (1988)

Richard finds a space alien in his morning cereal, and Aric recruits him to save Earth from his strange new classmate!

Aliens for Lunch (1988)

Richard and his best friend help an alien friend to stop enemy aliens from endangering all of the desserts on Earth.

Aliens for Dinner (1994)

Richard has to help his alien friend save Earth from polluting alien invaders who want to turn the planet into a toxic waste amusement park!