Month: April 2013

Alex Rider Eagle Strike by Anthony Horowitz

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Strap yourself in for a rocky ride as you travel through the pages of Eagle Strike.

Far from England in the South of France, Alex Rider’s peaceful holiday is interrupted by the sighting of Yassen Gregorovich, an arch enemy killer. A journalist dead, Sabina Pleasure kidnapped, and a pop-singer. Does any of that link with anything? From poisonous snakes to men with guns, Alex Rider is on a mission to deceive them all. But on his gripping adventure, Alex also has to find answers to his questions. Who is Damian Cray really? Why has Sabina been taken? But the biggest question of all: What is Eagle Strike? The question for readers of this bundle of paragraphs: which choice will the young spy take in the biggest dilemma of his life.

When you read Eagle Strike (Alex Rider), surprises pop out like fireworks. The drama in each book involving Alex (including this one) is so well written that my heart beats ten times faster than usual when I am going through dramatic parts in the story. I would definitely recommend Alex Rider to adventure lovers, and if you are looking for unusual places, than the whole Alex Rider series will fit you like a glove. Eagle Strike captivated me, then shocked me when I realized the truth about Yassen. Turn the pages that Anthony Horowitz has typed his story on, and prepare yourself to be embraced in a spinning world of spies and murderers. I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did!

Alex Rider Eagle Strike by Anthony Horowitz

Where The Mountain Meets The Moon by Grace Lin

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Rush into the pages of Where The Mountain Meets The Moon and be enveloped in a colourful spectrum of description.

Minli isn’t dull and muddy like the rest of her village, no, she is glowing like a lantern. Enchanted by her Father’s stories about the old man of the moon, one day Minli sets out to ask him how to bring fortune to her family. Minli is on a quest that could bring happiness in an unexpected way…

Where The Mountain Meets The Moon is a story that has a dazzling plot which is accompanied by breathtaking description. This book wrapped itself around me like a hug, then squeezed me so hard I could only push it off me when I had finished the story. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

Where The Mountain Meets The Moon by Grace Lin

The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate

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Ivan is a gorilla. He was brought from the wild into the Exit8 Big Top Mall and Video Arcade. When a tragedy strikes and Ivan makes a promise he knows will be very hard to fulfill, art still manages to take over Ivan’s life. Will Ivan ever take his rightful place as a mighty silverback?

The One and Only Ivan is a story that you can just pick up and enjoy. I think the mixture of different emotions is really just breathtaking, but although I would definitely recommend this to anyone, I personally prefer books with wider plots, like The Expeditioners (you can read my review on this). I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did!

The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate

The Expeditioners and the Treasure of the Drowned Man’s Canyon by S.S. Taylor

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When I laid my eyes on the first pages of The Expeditioners, metal chains sprung up and linked my eyes to the story.

Three children, explorers named Zander, Kit and MK, hold one map that could be the road to their fate… From slimy slugs to colossal birds, each child must pass them to get to the treasure everybody wants. Sukey Neville has entered the picture at the start of the journey, but is she a friend or not? How is the map supposed to be looked at? Who is good, or bad?

S.S. Taylor has mastered writing one of the most creative books that I have read. The story is based in the future, but sometimes, when I read a tale with lots of characters and an unusual time frame, the book can get confusing. Somehow the writer has managed to keep the story from becoming puzzling, which is one of my favourite things about this book. I admire how the author wrote something so original and captivating. The Expeditioners is like a crocodile that gulped me down so fast that I came out of its tail before I realized how much I enjoyed being in its stomach, in this case the middle of the story. I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did!

The Expeditioners and the Treasure of the Drowned Man’s Canyon by S.S. Taylor

The Swish Of The Curtain by Pamela Brown

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Sandra and Madelaine Fayne, Lynette and Jeremy Darwin are all citizens of Fenchester, living a normal life. Then one day Vicktoria, Nigel and Percy Halford come. All seven meet each other and make firm friends, but when life starts to get boring, the vicar’s wife proposes that they start a dramatic club. The idea is greeted with excitement and the children are soon becoming quite famous in Fenchester for their plays. But all the parents except Mrs Halford, who used to be a dancer, put their foot down when the children ask to go to a dramatic school. So desperate measures have to be taken. Will the Blue Door Theatre Company (as the children have called themselves) continue to be able to perform plays?

The Swish Of The Curtain has a mix of everything except adventure, so if you are a person who only likes reading adventure, then this might not be the right book for you. Metaphors have been left out a lot in this story, but then again it is quite hard to find places to include them. One of my favourite things about this book is that humour has been included, but only little bits that make you laugh and feel as if you know the character as well as your family. This collection of sentences is something that you can just pick up and start reading. The best thing about this book for me is that you get to see what its like for amateur actors behind the scenes and what kind of troubles they encounter before shows. The real moral of this story is that if you just face up to a problem then you must stay looking at it in the eyes and try to find a way to smooth it out again, because eventually the problem will be solved. I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did!

The Swish Of The Curtain by Pamela Brown

Bridge Of Time by Lewis Buzbee

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Brace yourself to be tossed around from one period of time to another on Lee, Joan and Sam’s thrilling adventure.

Lee and Joan are desperate to talk to each other about their parents new divorce, but when both fall asleep in a lighthouse at Fort Point they fall through time into 1864. There the two children meet Sam Clemens, the soon to be Mark Twain. What things will Lee, Joan and Sam see in the future or past? Who is the mysterious character following Sam? When are they is a question that Lee and Joan will ask many times, but how many times will both of them need to ask it?

Bridge Of Time has a very original plot, but my favourite thing about it is that although time travelling is a common subject to write about, Lewis Buzbee has managed to paint over the old way it is written about and made me look at it in a whole fresh, new way. Although some points of this book contain gripping and enjoyable reading, I wouldn’t put it down as one of my favourites. Some parts in Bridge Of Time can be a little confusing, but if you read through them slowly, they become easier to understand. To summarise this, I would say that Bridge Of Time is quite exhilerating but also at times, what was happening seemed puzzling to me.

Bridge Of Time by Lewis Buzbee

Alex Rider Skeleton Key by Anthony Horowitz

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Get ready to be plunged into this book like an airplane into deadly swamps! Prepare yourself to be grabbed and shaken by extraordinary possibilities when you read Alex Rider Skeleton Key.

When Alex Rider, a spy manipulated by the MI6, agrees to take a job as a ball boy at Wimbledon tennis courts, he finds himself assaulting some one from a band of deadly criminals. Alex  is now trying to unravel the ball of string plot that General Sarov has so carefully  wound. Will Alex Rider be able to stop something so big that it will go down as a record for the youngest boy ever to do in spy history?

This is the way the best adventure books should be written. The Alex Rider series, especially Skeleton Key, have a wide range of characters and settings, making the plot more creative and original. The story itself is like a winding path, with dozens of twists and turns, so that you can’t guess what happens next, but that is what I really loved about this book. If you like adventure, then the Alex Rider series are the perfect books for you. I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did!

Alex Rider Skeleton Key by Anthony Horowitz

Artemis Fowl and the Opal Deception by Eoin Colfer

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Is Opal still in a coma or not? That’s what Foaly, the gadget maker for LEP,is desperate to know. But if she is not then what?

Opal is determined to get her revenge on Holly Short, LEP agent, Foaly and Artemis Fowl, an ingenious criminal teenager. But will Holly be able to follow Commander Root’s last orders, to save Artemis from Opal? The consequence is a tense journey on the run from trolls.

Although I really enjoyed this book, I did think that Artemis Fowl and the Eternity Code (which you can read my review on) was a little bit easier to understand, but it was also a touch more gripping than Artemis Fowl and the Opal Deception.

This is a yarn that I was pushed into like a child into an enticing swimming pool. I could only turn the pages to see what would happen next and all sounds around me became quieter as my eyes brushed over the words of Artemis Fowl and the Opal Deception. I hope you can enjoy it as much as I have!

Artemis Fowl and the Opal Deception by Eoin Colfer