A Review of Spy School by Stuart Gibbs

A geeky boy goes to spy school, thinking his dreams are coming true, only to find out he got in for all the wrong reasons. And his insta-crush? Well, picture James Bond having a daughter who's just as kick-butt as he is, or more. In this case, James Bond is Alexander Hale, who recruits 12-year-old Ben Ripley to go to spy school, basically sweeping him off his feet with weapons and swashbuckliness.

Then Ben gets to the Academy of Espionage and is stunned to find himself in the middle of an attack. An older girl named Erica helps him make his way into the building and upstairs, with Ben fumbling every step of the way. Turns out this was all a test, and he didn't do so well.

Which meant I was now flanked by six heavily armed me in total darkness.

So I did the only other thing I could think of: I prepared to surrender.

I raised my hands over my head and backed against the principal's door, accidentally bumping the handle.

It lowered with a click.

Apparently, I'd unlocked it.

All six flashlight beams swung toward the sound.

I slipped into the darkened office, slammed the door shut, and promptly ran right into a coffee table. It cut me off at the knees, and I face-planted on the carpet.

The lights snapped on again.

I reflexively tucked myself into a ball and yelled, "Please don't kill me! I don't know anything! I just started here today!"

"Begging for mercy?" said a disappointed voice. "That's D-quality performance for sure."

There were murmurs of assent.

I slowly lifted my eyes from the deep-pile carpet. Instead of a horde of assassins facing me, I found myself facing a conference table.

Ben continues to bumble his way through being a student at the academy, where everyone else seems to be equal parts super-athlete and genius. So why is he the target of a real assassin? Why does his file say he has mad skills and is working on a special project?

To Ben's surprise, Erica continues to help him out, as does his new friend, the cynical Murray Hill. Erica is the best spy student in the school. Her attention to Ben makes the other kids believe he must be secretly superior, which leads to some funny assumptions and situations. The humor really makes this book a kick to read—particularly the satire about fictional spies and extra-special, gifted students in books like this one.

Ben is a pleasantly flawed and determined main character. As he plays detective with Erica's assistance, he starts catching glimpses of what might really be going on. Ben may not have the makings of a cinematic superspy, but he's a pretty smart kid, especially when it comes to math.

I do wish Gibbs had found a few more ways of using Ben's math abilities, although I understand Ben is simply trying to survive for most of the book. But eventually the pieces of the puzzle start coming together. Ben is both disillusioned and heartened to find out the truth about spy school, his own role there, and the villainous plot he's determined to stop. A cool summer read for upper middle grade and middle schoolers with both boy and girl appeal. Also—I'm guessing—the start of a very fun new series.

Note: If you like Spy School, try Chris Rylander's The Fourth Stall, Trenton Lee Stuart's Mysterious Benedict Society series, and Pseudonymous Bosch's Secret series.

A Review of The Agency: A Spy in the House by Y.S. Lee

Earlier this week, I read the new book in Ally Carter's Gallagher Girls series, Only the Good Spy Young, about a girls' boarding school that trains young spies. (Carter's series is a lot of fun!) Turn back the clock to Victorian-era London and you'll find Miss Scrimshaw's Academy for Girls, which has a similar mission. There bright lower-class girls are taught to be proper maids and ladies' companions, little knowing that the best of them will be recruited to act as spies while they're at it.

Orphan Mary Quinn is headed to the gallows for stealing bread at the age of 12 when she is abruptly rescued by a woman posing as a prison matron. Four years of study later, she finds out the secret of Scrimshaw Academy when she is invited to become a spy. An adventurous soul at heart, Mary accepts the invitation—and her first mission.

Mary is sent to be a lady's companion to an unpleasant merchant's daughter named Angelica, but her true purpose is to spy on the household, since Mr. Therold is suspected of buying and selling stolen artifacts in the Far East, crimes that technically occur outside of Scotland Yard's jurisdiction.

Mary soon chaffs at the feeling that she isn't getting much spying done, although she has been assigned merely to assist the primary agent on the case, whose identity she does not know. She wonders why the invalid Mrs. Therold goes to the doctor every afternoon, deals with the difficult Angelica as best she can, and tries to decide why a family acquaintance, James Easton, appears to be spying on the family, as well. (Um, could he be the agent? Or is he up to something else?) Although Mrs. Therold is encouraging Angelica to win the heart of James's besotted older brother, George, Angelica seems to be more interested in James herself. For his part, James seems attracted to Mary. Of course, at first he merely acts suspicious and cranky towards Mary, as well he might, considering she dresses up as a boy and sneaks out in the middle of the night to search Mr. Therold's warehouse.

While the touch of romance is fun, A Spy in the House is really focused on the mystery of the stolen artifacts and Mary's efforts to solve it, efforts that quickly outpace the scope of her original assignment. Along the way, Mary also manages to help the prickly Angelica, who has troubles of her own. Lee does an interesting job of making readers hate Angelica early in the book, then come to feel sorry for her later on.

A visit to a Lascars' refuge (an old folks home for Asian sailors) not only has a bearing on the case, but turns up surprising information about Mary's own past. Then the bodies start to pile up, and James begins to worry about Mary's safety, which irritates her no end. The boy really should worry about his own safety, and hope that Mary will be around to rescue him!

Fun (and impressive!) fact: The author has a Ph.D. in Victorian literature and culture.

This fresh take on the spy genre promises us more adventures with its supertitle, "A Mary Quinn Mystery." The narrative moves along briskly, and the power of Mary's longing to make more of herself—her longing for a challenge, really—makes her a heroine worth caring about. I'll be watching for Book 2.

A Review of Heist Society by Ally Carter

Ally Carter should be thanked for giving teenage girls their very own Alex Rider in her Gallagher Girls books: I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You; Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy; and Don't Judge a Girl by Her Cover; with Only the Good Spy Young coming out in June of this year. Now Carter brings us another series, but instead of a girl spy-in-training, we get a girl thief, one who's already surprisingly well trained in the family business.

A note about tone: unlike the boy spy and amateur vigilante/detective books reviewed above, let alone the Alex Rider books themselves, Ally Carter's books are lighthearted, fast-paced, and practically cute. Her work reminds me a lot of Meg Cabot's, with feisty heroines, conversations about clothes and boys, and plenty of humor. She also sprinkles in clever, good-looking boys who are attracted to our girl heroes. But saying that makes both Cabot and Carter's books sound like sheer fluff, and I would hasten to assert that one brand of good storytelling is, well, simply entertaining, with more of a movie/TV sensibility than a heavy-duty literary one.

In that light, I'll tell you that I got a real kick out of reading Heist Society. Here's how the flap copy starts out:

When Katarina Bishop was three, her parents took her on a trip to the Louvre...to case it. For her seventh birthday, Katarina and her Uncle Eddie traveled to Austria...to steal the crown jewels. When Kat turned fifteen, she planned a con of her own—scamming her way into the best boarding school in the country, determined to leave the family business behind. Unfortunately, leaving "the life" for a normal life proves harder than she'd expected.

Soon an old friend named Hale shows up and tells Kat that her father needs her help. One of the best thieves in the world, Kat's dad has been accused of stealing paintings from a very scary Italian business tycoon, the kind who employs his own people for handling payback. Disbelieving Kat's claims that her father is innocent, the man gives Kat a deadline for getting his paintings back. He also has his goons spy on Kat while she's working on the problem.

As the title suggests, this is a heist book. Think Ocean's Eleven with a group of teenagers. Although Carter's plot is stronger at some points than others, the overall trajectory of the story works. And teenage girl readers will enjoy the obvious attraction between Hale and Kat, as well as Kat's jealousy towards her beautiful, too-cool cousin, Gabrielle.

Kat is at the heart of the story, and while her unwillingness to see how much Hale likes her seems a little silly, her worries about the threat to her father and about engineering a successful heist in a nearly thief-proof museum make her all too human, someone readers will cheer for. (The only truly credulity-straining plot point is Kat's assumption about the location of the paintings, a gigantic leap upon which to base an entire heist! But oh well...)

Carter gives us some fun touches, such as the names of cons and strategies that our seasoned young thieves throw around during their planning meetings, e.g., Groundhog and Fallen Angels. Kat's team includes colorful characters, as does her larcenous family. We meet the mysterious Nick, an apparent rival for Kat's affections, and we glimpse the handiwork of a legendary thief, Romani, who takes a special interest in recovering artwork stolen by the Nazis during World War II. Plenty of sequel fodder here.

Heist Society is the kind of book that will make you smile—or, if you don't smile, your teenage daughter will. Because even though I really like Alex Rider's seriousness, it's a nice change to meet up with Ally Carter's version of the YA suspense story. One with a definite sense of humor.

Note for Worried Parents: This book is listed for YA, but it's pretty wholesome. I'm guessing some parents might not want their kids to read a book that glorifies teen thieves, though Kat is presented as being conflicted about her family's career in general, not to mention about the possibility of going to jail. Overall, she tends to have kind of a Robin Hood sensibility. There is some teen attraction in this book, also talk about how sexy Gabrielle looks. When Kat's boy buddies see her dressed up (for the first time), they comment with humorous amazement that she has boobs. Otherwise, we get some hugging, a quick kiss or two, and that's about it.

A Review of NERDS by Michael Buckley

I suppose it's inevitable that some of today's children's books would resemble TV writing, particularly the kind you encounter in Saturday morning cartoons of the post-Scooby Doo era. I first noticed this in Derek Landy's Skulduggery Pleasant, and I recently encountered it again in Greg Taylor's book, Killer Pizza. Another example is H.I.V.E.:Higher Institute of Villainous Education by Mark Walden. Now we see that shiny commercial quality in Michael Buckley's new book, NERDS. (Buckley is best known for his previous series, The Sisters Grimm.)

Of course, the trend is entirely understandable—not only are young readers familiar with the plot devices and characters from TV shows, but these same kids grow up to be people who write books. Having grouped the authors I just mentioned stylistically, I took a look at their backgrounds, assuming a couple of them would turn out to be screenwriters. I was oddly gratified to learn that every single one of them started off writing for film, television, or—in one case—video games.

Years ago, I talked to a producer of children's television programming because I had the clever idea I could write for TV, not to mention she knew my father. She kindly explained that most children's TV shows start out with the toys, not the plots and characters. The premise was always a packaged commodity which preceded any actual storytelling.

So you will probably know what I mean when I say that I suspect the team of fifth grade superspy nerds in Buckley's book came before his main character, Jackson Jones, or the plot of this first book in the series. Here's a description of the nerd crew from the flap copy:

Duncan "Gluestick" Dewey. He's a paste-eater who can stick to walls.
Ruby "Pufferfish" Peet. Her allergies help her detect danger and dishonesty.
Heathcliff "Choppers" Hodges. He controls minds with his buckteeth.
Julio "Flinch" Escala. His hyperactivity gives him super speed and strength.
Matilda "Wheezer" Choi. Her inhalers enable her to fly and blast enemies.

Then we have the new recruit: Jackson "Braceface" Jones, a popular kid who picked on the school nerds relentlessly until he got braces and became one of their number in a matter of hours.

Except that Jackson falls into their midst by accident, and they don't like it. Forced to train him, the nerds exact their revenge (movie allusion not necessarily intended!). After a lot of misery for our guy Jackson, in which he bumbles the training routines and ruins a couple of missions, to boot, the other kids sort of begin to consider him as one of the team. Only that doesn't happen till the tail end of the book, which means we spend a lot of page time on payback before zeroing in on the supervillain and his evil plans.

"Popular boy learns to be nice to nerds" is almost as overdone as "popular boy learns he underestimated the nerds." Here we have both. But—sigh—a lot of kids are going to like this. It may be that only cranky old fantasy readers like myself will roll their eyes at the predictability of the plotting.

Because there is a place for rollicking, TV-esque books in today's children's section, and NERDS is kinda cute. Did I tell you what NERDS stands for, by the way? That would be "National Espionage, Rescue, and Defense Society."

Now that Buckley has established his crew of young superspies, I hope his next book in the series will relax and introduce some surprises, along with more character depth. Clever plotting is not a bad place to begin, but even the most adventurous stories need to give us characters who really capture our hearts.

Note for Worried Parents: Though some of you may be pleased that the nerds are cast as superheroes, their weaknesses turning into strengths, others may be troubled by the strong stereotyping of nerds based on certain physical characteristics.

A Review of Death by Denim by Linda Gerber

This is one of the more intriguing mystery titles you’ll come across, perhaps even more so than the title of Gerber’s first book in the Aphra Connolly series, Death by Bikini. (Book 2 was Death by Latte.) I hope you’re not too squeamish to imagine just how denim might be used as a murder weapon.

Aphra began her adventures in Book One at a private resort run by her father on a remote tropical island. That’s where she met Seth Mulo, who was in hiding with his parents from some deadly enemies. In her attempts to uncover Seth’s secrets, Aphra inadvertently gave the bad guys the location of Seth’s family. So it seems like cosmic payback that in Book Three, Aphra and her mother are now in hiding themselves from the Mole, a rogue CIA operative with way too much power. Of course, Aphra does get to sneak around out in Paris instead of in Dulltown, USA, which is way more fun for readers.

As acting school librarian (long story), I often get requests for books for teens, and more and more of the kids are saying that they don’t want “a boring story.” In that case, the Aphra Connolly books are a good choice. In the first few pages of Death by Denim, Aphra and her mother realize they’ve been discovered by their enemies. The rest of the book is mostly about trying to get away from the Mole and his minions. Death by Denim moves fast.

There are delicious twists and turns along the way, with Gerber revisiting her theme of “Who can you trust?” Unfortunately, Aphra doesn’t always get it right. Relying on her less-than-stellar skills at evasive maneuvers, she leaves her mother behind, then ends up leading the Mole right to Seth Mulo and his parents, who are now hiding in Italy. (I’m pretty sure Seth and Aphra have yet to go on a date, not unless you count running around trying not to get shot. It’s hard to maintain a long-distance relationship when one person is in the international version of the Witness Protection Program, let alone when both are.)

Death by Denim represents a turning point in this series. As the book ends, Aphra is thinking about college, having defeated her arch nemesis. She has also been recruited for a whole new role in the world of espionage (though not by her protective CIA agent mother). Since too many series writers end up producing what is essentially the same plot over and over, I really like the way this author refuses to let her series stagnate.

If your daughters have been reading Alex Rider, introduce them to Aphra Connolly. She’s the perfect fit for a generation of text-messaging girls who want an adventurous read featuring a young shero.

Note for Worried Parents: Gerber’s books are remarkably wholesome considering that they’re Young Adult titles, but they do include a lot of peril and the occasional action/adventure-type death.

Disclosure Note: Linda Gerber is in my long-time writing group. She's at work on another action-packed YA series with Puffin.