Friday, March 21, 2014

Sky Raiders by Brandon Mull

You have to be very careful on Halloween.  Some of the monsters are real...

Alladin and Edelweiss gave me the opportunity to read this book for review (thank you).  It was published March 11th and is the first in the Five Kingdoms series.  It is written for children aged 8-12 and it's a grand adventure!

Cole has a crush on Jenna and he's trying to extend his time out with her on Halloween.  He talks her and his best friend to trying the new haunted house.  As the group of children go in, they are sure it won't be anything too scary; it isn't until they get shoved in the basement.  The children are chained and then shoved in cages.  Once the portal opens, they are lead away into a new world.  Cole manages to escape, but he can't let his friends go without helping them.  So he jumps through the portal on his own.  And ends up in a world he's never seen before...

The children were kidnapped to become slaves.  Cole has big plans to help them escape, but one of the caged girls gives an alarm and he's captured, too.   He's punished for his actions.  He also gets sold to a group on the road that specialize in salvage.  It doesn't take long to realize that most of the young ones don't live long enough to retire.

This is the first story in a new series and Mr. Mull does an excellent job with it.  You can envision the world and you understand why life is so cheap.  It's a hard life with unknown dangers.  Even the known dangers are bigger than Cole can imagine.

I found this to be a fine fantasy adventure that had me rooting for the kids.  I can't wait to see what happens in the next book and I know your young one will feel the same way.  Travel to different worlds, fight monsters and try to save your friends.  What more could you want?

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