A free-wheeling, engaging espionage tale that aims to enlighten readers.
In this YA novel, a teenage protagonist contends with the terrorist hijacking of a commercial plane.
Justin Reed is a 14-year-old orphan whose father was killed by a nefarious spy, the Pharaoh. Unable to apprehend him on his own and in grave danger, Justin is given safe refuge by Bob Cheney, a CIA agent, who eventually adopts him. Bob trains Justin to become a talented operative, which only makes his assimilation into normal teen life all the more difficult. While at school one day, Justin comes to the aid of a defenseless peer preyed upon by bullies and uses his skills to manhandle the whole bunch. He’s suspended from school, and a frustrated Bob takes Justin with him on a trip to Israel, which is really a covert mission. Radical Islamic terrorists, who announce their allegiance to the World Islamic State Caliphate, hijack the plane carrying Bob and Justin. An organization with global reach, the caliphate seeks to consolidate the world’s terrorist groups under one chain of command, largely bankrolled by Naristan, the fictional Mideast country concocted by the author. The attempt to commandeer the plane turns out to be just one phase of a much grander plot to instigate world war, and Justin is once again called to duty. Auxier (Cartel Kidnapping, 2014, etc.), a commercial airline pilot, uses his thorough knowledge of aviation to make the action believable. Of course, the story is extravagantly implausible, but it’s intended to be, and the plot unfurls with as much credibility as possible for a fantastical adventure. While the story is clearly fashioned for a YA audience, Auxier injects some serious educational content. Bob patiently explains to Justin how to understand the persistent problem of violent Islamic radicalism: “And that points to the true root of their problems, I believe, which lie not so much with religion, but with tribal and cultural prejudices. And, perhaps greatest of all, economic strife.” Whether this is historically accurate is beside the point; the author provides a thoughtful perspective for young readers to ponder and discuss with their parents. This is the third installment in the Code Name: Dodger series, and the author seems to have perfected a combination of adolescent whimsy and historical gravity that will likely appeal to the targeted audience.
A free-wheeling, engaging espionage tale that aims to enlighten readers.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5143-9597-4
Page Count: 208
Publisher: EALiterary Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 26, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.
In this YA graphic novel, an alienated Métis girl learns about her people’s Canadian history.
Métis teenager Echo Desjardins finds herself living in a home away from her mother, attending a new school, and feeling completely lonely as a result. She daydreams in class and wanders the halls listening to a playlist of her mother’s old CDs. At home, she shuts herself up in her room. But when her history teacher begins to lecture about the Pemmican Wars of early 1800s Saskatchewan, Echo finds herself swept back to that time. She sees the Métis people following the bison with their mobile hunting camp, turning the animals’ meat into pemmican, which they sell to the Northwest Company in order to buy supplies for the winter. Echo meets a young girl named Marie, who introduces Echo to the rhythms of Métis life. She finally understands what her Métis heritage actually means. But the joys are short-lived, as conflicts between the Métis and their rivals in the Hudson Bay Company come to a bloody head. The tragic history of her people will help explain the difficulties of the Métis in Echo’s own time, including those of her mother and the teen herself. Accompanied by dazzling art by Henderson (A Blanket of Butterflies, 2017, etc.) and colorist Yaciuk (Fire Starters, 2016, etc.), this tale is a brilliant bit of time travel. Readers are swept back to 19th-century Saskatchewan as fully as Echo herself. Vermette’s (The Break, 2017, etc.) dialogue is sparse, offering a mostly visual, deeply contemplative juxtaposition of the present and the past. Echo’s eventual encounter with her mother (whose fate has been kept from readers up to that point) offers a powerful moment of connection that is both unexpected and affecting. “Are you…proud to be Métis?” Echo asks her, forcing her mother to admit, sheepishly: “I don’t really know much about it.” With this series opener, the author provides a bit more insight into what that means.
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.Pub Date: March 15, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-55379-678-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HighWater Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 28, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Bulky, balky, talky.
In an updated quest for the Holy Grail, the narrative pace remains stuck in slo-mo.
But is the Grail, in fact, holy? Turns out that’s a matter of perspective. If you’re a member of that most secret of clandestine societies, the Priory of Sion, you think yes. But if your heart belongs to the Roman Catholic Church, the Grail is more than just unholy, it’s downright subversive and terrifying. At least, so the story goes in this latest of Brown’s exhaustively researched, underimagined treatise-thrillers (Deception Point, 2001, etc.). When Harvard professor of symbology Robert Langdon—in Paris to deliver a lecture—has his sleep interrupted at two a.m., it’s to discover that the police suspect he’s a murderer, the victim none other than Jacques Saumière, esteemed curator of the Louvre. The evidence against Langdon could hardly be sketchier, but the cops feel huge pressure to make an arrest. And besides, they don’t particularly like Americans. Aided by the murdered man’s granddaughter, Langdon flees the flics to trudge the Grail-path along with pretty, persuasive Sophie, who’s driven by her own need to find answers. The game now afoot amounts to a scavenger hunt for the scholarly, clues supplied by the late curator, whose intent was to enlighten Sophie and bedevil her enemies. It’s not all that easy to identify these enemies. Are they emissaries from the Vatican, bent on foiling the Grail-seekers? From Opus Dei, the wayward, deeply conservative Catholic offshoot bent on foiling everybody? Or any one of a number of freelancers bent on a multifaceted array of private agendas? For that matter, what exactly is the Priory of Sion? What does it have to do with Leonardo? With Mary Magdalene? With (gulp) Walt Disney? By the time Sophie and Langdon reach home base, everything—well, at least more than enough—has been revealed.
Bulky, balky, talky.Pub Date: March 18, 2003
ISBN: 0-385-50420-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2003
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