ISABELLE NIGHT AND THE DEMON'S FLUTE

In Goode’s YA thriller, a 13-year-old adventurer and her archeologist mother become entangled in a deadly mystery at a remote dig site in the Middle East.

With seventh grade officially concluded, Bostonian teen Isabelle Night is looking forward to summer vacation, when she can do absolutely nothing. But when her mother Annaliese—the head archaeologist for the Massachusetts Arts and Antiquities Museum in Boston and an expert in ancient cultural folklore—is asked to help a friend at a Syrian excavation site, Isabell’s planned “summer of nothing” suddenly becomes anything but. Once at the site, Isabelle and her mother learn that the team, led by Annaliese’s longtime friend and University of Munich archaeology professor Gunther Braun, has uncovered an api—a Well of the Netherworld. (“Only eyes trained in archaeology would have known this had once been a tightly constructed wall. A wall to protect those outside from falling in, or a wall to keep something inside from coming out? Isabelle wondered.”) When dangerous-looking men associated with a secret cabal show up looking for an artifact known as the Queen’s Flute, and people begin disappearing around the sinister hole in the ground, Isabelle and her mother realize, too late, that the well is a portal to another dimension, one inhabited by demons—and that the missing artifact is the only thing that could possibly stop nightmarish creatures from walking the earth. All the elements are here for an unputdownable read—breakneck pacing, nonstop action, and impressive plot twists—but the focus on character development and relationship dynamics is the story’s real strength. Isabelle’s close bond with her mother and her tenuous connection with her deadbeat father, Carmichael (who also works in the archaeology field), lend the narrative emotional depth and authenticity. Isabelle’s budding relationship with Braun’s grandson Will adds a subtle romance element as well.

Well drawn characters on a rousing adventure reminiscent of Indiana Jones’ exploits.