Book review: the Alex Rider series by Anthony Horowitz
The 10th anniversary UK covers for the first eight books
I finally finished reading the entire nine book “Alex Rider” series by Anthony Horowitz and let me tell you, it was one hell of a ride (yes, pun intended). I finished the first eight books quickly enough (one book every 4-5 days) but delayed finishing the last book because I didn’t want my adventure to end just yet. *sob*
Meet Alex Rider - a 14-year-old British orphan living with his overseas banker uncle Ian and American housekeeper Jack Starbright in a nice house in Chelsea. He goes to Brookland Comprehensive. He’s intelligent, charming, and popular with his classmates. He’s captain of the football team and wants to be a pro footballer when he grows up. Oh, and he knows karate, speaks fluent French, German, and Spanish plus a little Italian, and likes extreme sports like scuba diving, rock climbing, rapelling, surfing, and snowboarding. Ordinary, right?
His world comes crashing down soon after his 14th birthday when Iandies in a “car accident” because he wasn’t wearing his seatbelt. But Ian was always careful. Alex investigates his uncle’s death and finds out more than he could have imagined: his uncle was an operative for MI6 - a spy - and killed during his last mission by hardened assassin Yassen Gregorovitch. Ian’s “work trips” abroad where he came home injured? Missions. Ian and Alex’s vacations abroad (where Ian forced Alex to speak like a local), karate lessons, and extreme sports? Training for Alex. MI6 forcibly recruits Alex - threatening to deport Jack if he refuses - because his unique combination of skill and youth makes him the perfect candidate to take over Ian’s unfinished business: investigating businessman Herod Sayle and his “generous” gift of a revolutionary Stormbreaker computer for every classroom in Britain. Thus begins next two years of Alex Rider’s life, where he faces off with a Portuguese man-o-war, snowboards down a mountain on an ironing board, escapes a great white shark, has tea with a mad pop star, trains in a special training school for assassins, goes into outer space, stops a tsunami, blows up a dam, and experiences his greatest tragedy.
Read the rest of the review here. :D