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Sources
Reviews
- Book Review PodCast by Lani and Kelvin,
from Pt. England School, New Zealand.
"Midnight Rescue" by Robin Kerr is the book reviewed in this episode. Lani from Room 17 has been reading the book and asked Kelvin to be his DJ. This is Kelvin's first podcast.
Midnight Rescue is a story about a girl called Kate who moves to a new town with her family and has to leave her friends behind. The first kids she meets at her new place are two boys called Chris and Alex. They think they are really cool because they got a book out of the library about abseiling and they are trying to teach themselves how to do it. They don't know that Kate is a very experienced abseiler and even owns her own gear. They tell her that she can't join in with them because girls are scared of heights. Well you can guess from the title of the book that someone has to get rescued, and we can tell you that it wasn't Kate! She was the one who was DOING the rescue. Lani is sure you will enjoy reading this book as much as he did. Why don't you get it out of the library and see for yourself?
- What middle-grade student wouldn't love to be recruited to solve heinous crimes perpetrated against their peers by diabolical masterminds? Lucie Lakewood, youngest in an odd-ball family of code breakers and hackers, and her fellow sleuth Rodney Keino, descended from a lineage of Kenyan marathoners, combine their inherited passions to form an unlikely but formidable team. In the co-released Case One and Case Two of the Short Division of the World Secrete Service, our freshly minted sleuths unravel schemes of brainwashing and abduction which could have sprung from the mind of Ian Flemming. Author Robin Kerr treats readers to a gripping romp through a world of fiendish plots, engagingly odd family dynamics, Mad Magazine humor, exotic locales, and Pickwickian characters.
Michael Donnelly
(Author of YA novel Awakening Curry Buckle)
- From a seriously well-connected, rambling old house, hidden deep within an over-grown, thorny hedge maze, young Lucie and Rodney work with the World Secret Service to solve the world's great puzzles, thwarting an evil mind-control scheme (not so cleverly disguised as the latest commercial fad) one day, a megalomaniacal tyrant (and freeing his kidnapped child-slave-labor ring) the next. Their impressive familiarity with current technology, wide range of physical skills and code-breaking tactics, (acquired with persistent practice, trial and error, and dry wit) and careful logic more than made up for the fact that they are only 13 years old and must work within and around the tiresome strictures of an ordinary middle school schedule. The kids are smart and self-sufficient, the action brisk, the settings are varied and interesting. It will be fun to see how this series develops. It could become quite addictive!
Carolyn Conahan
(Author and Illustrator of "The Twelve Days of Cristmas Dogs" published by Dutton, and Staff Illustrator of Cricket Magazine)
- Middle-schooler Lucie Lakewood comes from a long line of code breakers. She and her best friend, Rodney, are quick-thinking, fast-moving members of The Short Division of the World Secret Service, the junior division of an undercover organization run by her father. Luckily for Portland's younger readers, author Robin Kerr has come out with two "Short Division" cases at once. In "Case One: The Bobblings," Lucie and Rodney tackle an evil toymaker and a brain-washed mother. In "Case Two: Stolen Children," they take on kidnapping, cyber-crime and rock climbing on the side.
Katie Schneider
(Special to The Oregonian, September 17th 2006)
- . . . we finished Case One last Friday. They all clapped. It was adorable. Several of them started reading Case Two this weekend and couldn't stop talking about it today. Ah, the power of words . . .
Shannon Wasson
(Middle Grade Language Arts Teacher)
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