In New York a man is murdered while investigating 'Real Time' an Augmented Reality Company who creates videogames. This book is the 14^th book in the Alex Rider Series. At the beginning of this book, Alex’s best friend Tom gets kidnapped when they are skateboarding in London. Alex tries to chase the kidnappers; however, they get away with Tom. Alex, however, does not need to wait long for the kidnappers to get in contact. The kidnappers are Nightshade and they are back for revenge. In order to get his friend back, he needs to break one of Nightshade’s members out of prison, a boy who tried to kill him in the last book, Freddy Grey.

In order to free Freddy Grey and exchange him for his friend, Alex is forced to break into a high security prison, smuggling a gun past security. When Alex reaches Freddy, he comes up with a plan to help them escape. They manage to escape successfully, and are taken by Nightshade to an airfield where Alex is captured and Nightshade break their promise and shoot Tom. Nightshade then flee before Alex can stop them.

Does Tom survive?

What link does Real Time have to Nightshade?

Does Alex stop Nightshade?

Read the book to find out!

We recommend this book to 10+ readers who like action novels, you don’t have to read the other Alex Rider books beforehand but it is recommended.

We give it 5***** and we hope that this is not the last book in the Alex Rider series. Please write another one Anthony Horowitz!

Leo and his best friend Sangeeta are the only ones that look different to everyone else in their school. On the day this book starts Leo and Sangeeta are on a school trip to Rochester Cathedral and the RAF Museum.  When they are on a tour inside the cathedral with an old man called Mr Young, Leo is shocked to see a World War II memorial above a door with his name on it - Leo Hai Lim. Leo now knows that his mission is to find out more about him and why he received the Distinguished Flying Cross; one of the rarest medals an RAF pilot can get. With his new found determination, Leo suggests Forgotten Heroes as the theme for his class project on WWII. The project takes on even more significance when the class learn it will be put forward for a national Remembrance Day competition with the winning prize being a TV appearance.

For his mission to discover more about Leo Hai Lim, Leo is helped by some of his friends.  Sangeeta’s role is to track down information on the part played by Indian soldiers in the war but she is thrilled when she discovers more about the role played by women in the war too. He’s also helped, to his surprise, by Olivia Morris, who is known by everyone as the coolest kid in their school but why would she help him?

However, Leo’s efforts to find out more information also get him into trouble with his parents (when he calls his Aunty Su in Singapore at midnight) and with his school (when he tries to break into the RAF Museum at Rochester Cathedral). Despite this, Leo’s determination to find out about the ‘Real Leo’ continues, even when a bully sabotages his work! Leo eventually discovers that a lot more people in his class are on his side and want to help him than he originally thought.

Do they win the competition?

Can they fix the sabotaged work before the competition ends?

You must read the book to find out!

We give this book 5***** and recommend it to 9+ readers. We love Onjali Q. Raúf’s books especially as she writes books about being different and problems that young people face in society today.

This book is about two friends called Arun and Sam. They are both at school when a girl called Donna tells them that she saw police outside Arun’s house. Donna is not seen as a good influence on students at school; her dad is in prison and she is always bunking off lessons but she manages to convince Arun and Sam to bunk off with her and break out of the school to see what is going on.

On their way to Arun’s house, a man tries to kidnap Arun but Donna saves him by spraying the man with pepper spray. When they arrive home, there are police around the house so they have to sneak in. They manage to get in and they find out that Arun’s dad has been kidnapped. They realise that they can’t trust the police to get the job done so they take matters into their own hands. They steal Arun’s dad’s laptop and run away to Sam’s house where they discover the plans to build a secret robot called MANDROID. Is this linked to Arun’s dad being kidnapped?

What is MANDROID capable of?

Can Arun and his friends find MANDROID?

Can they save his father?

Read the book to find out. We recommend this book to 10+ readers who enjoy action packed novels. We give it 5*****

We are looking forward to book two in this series, as we enjoyed this book and we loved Jason Rohan’s first series of books. We are so glad to see that Jason is back writing again!

Willa is one of 6 children plagued by the curse of six daughters. She lives with her older sisters, Grace and Freya and her younger sisters who are triplets named Dolly, Darcy and Deedee. She also lives with her kind Grammy and controlling, curse-obsessed Dadder. Dadder has arranged for Grace to marry a horrible old man in the village called Silas Kirby in exchange for one of his fine horses but Grace doesn’t want to marry him. He needs Grace to be married otherwise the curse says that he will be buried dead by his youngest daughter.

One night, leading up to the day of Grace’s marriage to Silas Kirby, a fayre arrives in town called The Full Moon Fayre. The three oldest sisters see this as an opportunity to escape for a while from the horrors of their world but it doesn’t go to plan. Whilst at the fayre, Grace sees a fortune teller. Grace hopes for some comfort in her future but instead the fortune teller gives her, her money back and tells her to run. The next morning Grace is gone.

In the following months, Dadder becomes increasing cruel to his daughters, especially Willa because now the curse is coming true as Grace never married anyone. One night Dadder makes Willa sleep in the cold barn outside so Willa decides that she has had enough. She steals Dadder’s new horse, gifted to him by Silas Kirby and sets out to find her sister.

Does she find her sister?

Does Silas Kirby get angry that his horse has been stolen?

Does the curse come true?

Read the book to find out!

We give this book 5 stars and we recommend this book to 9+ readers who enjoy a story about magic and family. If you like the sound of this book, you need to check other Lucy Strange’s other books too – there are lots of reviews on our website!

 

This book is about a girl called Genna and it is the second book in the series. If you haven’t read the first book, we recommend that you read it first as this review will contain spoilers and may not make sense.

Since the first book Genna has been struggling to come to terms with her experience of past lives and glimmers. She has been meeting with her psychiatrist on a weekly basis. He does a variety of exercises with her to help her cope and to help her go from a victim to a survivor. On one particular day, the psychiatrist tries to convince Genna that her past lives are not real by making her have a forced glimmer. Genna had not had a glimmer since Phoenix had left after the death of Tanas. Her psychiatrist tells her that she builds up stories from all the different history books she has read and that her glimmers are all a figment of her imagination to help her cope with the stress of being kidnapped. Once Genna believes that this is the only possible solution to her problems, she finally accepts that her therapy is over.

However, these are not the only issues that Genna experiences; at school Genna is bullied. A group of girls, one of which used to be her friend, call her names from Newspaper headlines like “Teenage Terrorist” and laugh at her in the corridors. To make her life even harder Genna is convinced that she keeps seeing Damien, one of Tanas’ followers. One day, after the girls had called her names, she saw a hooded figure standing in the corner of her school and she thought it was Damien.

The day before Genna’s Barbados trip to celebrate the end of her therapy, she goes to her friend Priya’s house for a sleepover to celebrate Priya’s birthday. On the morning of her trip, Genna’s friend gets a call saying that her house had been broken into during the night. Luckily no one was in the house when they broke in and no one had been hurt. Unluckily for Genna, they also broke into her house and when they did, Genna’s parents were home. She was about to get the shock of her life…

Who broke into her house?

What happened to her parents?

You will have to read the book to find out.

We recommend this book to 10+ readers who enjoy adventure novels.

We give this book 5***** even though we didn’t like the cliff hanger at the end and we can’t wait for the next book in the series.

Also, we want to thank Chris Bradford for sending us a signed copy for our bookshelf and for quoting us in the book.

This book is about a girl called Aniyah and her little brother Noah. Aniyah and Noah have just been moved to a foster home because their mum is gone but she wants to find her. The last encounter that Aniyah remembers with her mum is her mum telling her that they were playing a big game of hide and seek and they needed to hide for as long as possible from Aniyah’s dad.

Aniyah and Noah aren’t the only ones in the foster home, there are also three other children called Travis, Ben and Sophie. Travis and Ben are really nice to Aniyah and Noah when they arrive and they get on well but Sophie is really mean to them as well as to everyone in the foster home. The foster home is run by a lady called Mrs Iwuchukwu. She is a really nice lady and unlike Aniyah’s dad she never seems to get mad, even when Noah wets the bed every night.

Aniyah wants to be a “Star Hunter” which is what she calls astronomers. When she was younger her mum taught her about stars and she knows all the constellations in the sky. She believes that her mum has become a star and after she sees on the TV in her foster home that a new star has been spotted, she knows it is her mum. The woman on the TV says that there will be a competition to name the star and Aniyah is really excited until she finds out how many people are entering the competition.

She needs a plan to make sure that her mum’s star is given the correct name and it’s a race against time as she doesn’t have long left.

Can she get the help of her new foster siblings?

Does she get there in time?

Do they get to name the star?

Read the book to find out!

We recommend this book to 11+ readers who enjoy an emotional story with lots of adventures! We give this book 5*****

Warning - this book contains some upsetting topics. 

We recommend all of Onjali's other books! We have reviewed a couple of them already, so have a look if you want to find out more!

Finally, well done Onjali on your MBE. What an achievement! 

Thank You to @Sounddelivery for sending us a copy of The Lion Above the Door. We can’t wait to read it and a review will follow shortly!

A quick Thank You to The Reading Agency who recently sent us Pony by R J Palacio. We can’t wait to read it and a book review will definitely be coming soon.

#ChooseCourage

This book is about a girl called Alexa and her friends Tom, Josie, and Michael. They live in England and they are only nine years old.

There used to be an empty seat at the back of their class but one day a new boy arrives and sits there. They are told that his name is Ahmet. Ahmet is a strange boy; he is shy and never speaks to anyone even when they try to speak to him. He also doesn’t join in with them at break-time because he stays inside the whole time. This confuses Alexa and her friends and they begin to feel sorry for the boy and want to become his friends. They start by giving him treats after school but he doesn’t want to take them. However, they don’t give up.

One day Alexa, Josie, Tom, and Michael overhear teachers talking about Ahmet and they learn that he is a refugee child from Syria and that no one speaks his language. They also hear some of the parents outside the school gate spreading lies and being rude about Ahmet and saying that he should be sent back to his homeland.

In the following days Ahmet is bullied by a horrible boy who goes by the nickname of Brendan the bully because Ahmet is different to everyone else. Alexa and her friends soon realise that Ahmet needs a friend now more than ever. The longer they stay with him and look after him, the more they find out about him and his family’s long and treacherous journey from Syria to England.

Eventually Ahmet tells them that on his journey Ahmet’s sister drowned in the Mediterranean Sea and his parents stayed behind in other countries because they burdened him as they were sick and poor. Despite this, Ahmet is still confident that his parents are alive, so upon hearing his story Alexa and her friends realise they must help him. They know that the border is going to close in a couple of weeks and that they need to come up with a plan to find Ahmet’s parents before this deadline, but it is not going to be easy!

Do they come up with a plan in time?

Do they find Ahmet’s parents before the border closes?

Does Ahmet become accepted as a proper member of their class?

Read the book to find out!

We really enjoyed this book and we definitely would give it 5 stars. We recommend this book to 9+ readers but also to adults, as it shows us all as a society that if a group of children can do something anyone can!

This is a book about a boy called Jimmy Coates. Jimmy thinks he is a normal boy, however he really is a genetically designed assassin who will be ready to report to the government (NJ7) by the age of 18. The start of this series occurs when some men in suits come to Jimmy’s house to take him away for an early mission. Jimmy doesn’t know why they are there or who they are so Jimmy follows his instincts, and runs. Jimmy goes up to his room, jumps out of the window, and hides under his car. The agents cannot find Jimmy as they have seriously underestimated his skill, so they take Jimmy’s family hostage. Jimmy has now become a fugitive.

Jimmy is later found by NJ7 and is made to work for them. His first target is a man who opposes the government called Christopher Viggo. He is trying to turn Britain back into a democracy as it is a Neo – Democracy which means people do not have the right to vote and everything sold in Britain is British.

When Jimmy goes to assassinate Viggo, he tells him that he can help Jimmy save his family.

Does Jimmy save his family?

Does Viggo help him?

Read the book to find out. We finished the series in a couple of days as we couldn’t put the books down! We give this book (and the other books in the series) 5 stars and recommend them to 9+ readers. We really love this series and cannot wait for the final book in the series to be released!