Anthony Horowitz’s Stormbreaker is a 240 page flurry of chases. A boy named Alex has his Uncle Ian Rider die, supposedly in a car crash because of an unbuckled seatbelt. Knowing Ian always buckled his seat belt, Alex investigated and found out that his uncle had been a spy and died on a mission. The same organization that sent Ian decided to also send Alex because a suspicious man, Herod Sayle, was giving a new model computer of his invention, Stormbreaker, to all the children of English schools. The organization, M16, found a contest where a boy in Florida had won a chance to try out the Stormbreaker. The sent him a consolation prize and sent Alex to test the computer so he could snoop around. While Alex was there, he was chased by everything from quads to a harsh lady telling him he was in an off- limits area. When Alex finally finds out that the evil scheme included a virus built in to harm all the school children, Herod imprisons Alex in a jellyfish tank. Alex attempted an escape and arrived just in time to stop Herod’s revenge on the prime minister and save the schools. This first class novel was at the top of my reading list and should be at the top of yours too!

Skeleton Key Blog

Skeleton Key, a 327 page thriller by Anthony Horowitz, had enough action to keep the book glued to my hands and my eyes wide open. Alex Rider, the main character, starts out as a ball boy at the Wimbledon tournament because suspicious things are occurring there that Alex needs to check out. After a painful fight with a Chinese gang member, Alex is shipped off to a distant island called Skeleton Key for safety. A search for an evil man with enough uranium to blow up all of Russia’s submarine fleet in Murmansk and then some, leads Alex to be captured by this man. It turned out the man, Alexei Sarov, had lost a son about Alex’s age and wished for Alex to replace him. When Alex reused repeatedly, Sarov decided to leave Alex in Murmansk for when the bomb blows up. Alex nearly disabled the bomb, so Sarov came back and attempted to shoot Alex. Finding he couldn’t bring himself to do it, Sarov shot himself just as a rescue party got Alex out of Murmansk and disabled the bomb. I hope you can now see why I was so fascinated by the story and recommend that you read it too!