DOC WILDE AND THE FROGS OF DOOM

When their scientist grandfather disappears again, 12-year-old Brian, his ten-year-old sister, Wren, and their world-renowned father, Dr. Spartacus Wilde, are off on an adventure to kick off Byrd’s debut novel and the first volume in a new series. The high-tech Indiana Jones–type tale takes the adventurers to the uncharted South American jungles of Hidalgo to find Grandpa Wilde, who had researched dark matter and the possibility of traveling to other universes. The problem is that Frogon, a dark god from another universe, wants to take over ours. Besides finding Grandpa, the Wildes must face a glut of frogs—spy frogs, man-frogs, saber-toothed frogs and the dark elder god frog—and save the universe. Written in fast-paced, intelligent prose laced with humor and literary allusions ranging from Dante to Dr. Seuss, the story has all of the fun of old-fashioned pulp adventures. A tale “terrifying and dark, of indescribable horrors and eldritch mysteries,” this is sure to be Wilde-ly popular, and readers will anxiously await future installments. (Adventure. 8-12)