Stormbreaker by Anthony Horowitz
I've been wanting to begin this series about a 14 year-old spy for a long time, and was so pleased when a friend loaned me the book. I've enjoyed the British television program Horowitz writes, Foyle's War, so I was quite certain of good quality writing. I love spy stories from The Thirty-nine Steps by John Buchan to the Mrs Pollifax books by Dorothy Gilman.
The story begins with young Alex Rider's uncle and guardian dying in a car accident. Alex begins to wonder because the uncle was not buckled, and that was not like him at all. Then some strange people show up at the funeral, one of whom has a gun. The story goes on from there at a fast pace. The book was a pure pleasure for me to read. It has all the fun elements of a good spy novel, from a modernistic factory compound out in the middle of remote, beautiful Cornwall countryside to a weird giant jellyfish in a fish tank (shades of a James Bond movie). He is even given some 007 type gadgets to get him out of tricky situations. Alex is a reluctant spy, but we see that his late uncle has actually been training him for the job all through his childhood. I can't wait to read the next books in the series, and to see the movie based on this book.
More tales from Edinburgh, I'm afraid: my older children love these books (one of them walked home from the bookshop reading the latest volume as she went, barely looking where she was going).They've been to hear Anthony Horowitz speak at the Edinburgh Book Festival and they say he's superb.
ReplyDeleteLucky, lucky, lucky. :<) Do you live in Scotland?
ReplyDeleteNan, I'd recently read an article in Scouting magazine (the adult magazine for Boy Scout leaders) about getting boys excited about reading. This book was mentioned. I brought it home from the library and Matthew is hooked!
ReplyDeletePatrice, that's great! They are big hits in Tom's Junior High library, too! I think I've read three, but there are quite a few more.
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