Two For One: Infinity Ring Books Six and Seven

The Infinity Ring series is the latest print and online combination series by Scholastic that takes a story that starts in the books and continues it online through a game that is accesses using a special code from the book. Scholastic's first attempt at this combination was the popular 39 Clues series which is still going strong with it's third spin-off series. Like the 39 Clues series, each book in the Infinity Ring series is written by a different author. Where this series differs, however, is that the online game tells a part of the story that isn't included in the books. While you don't HAVE to play the online game to understand the series, you do miss details and part of the adventure if you don't signup and play the game.

Behind Enemy Lines by Jennifer A. Nielsen

Book six in the series has Dak, Sera, and Riq landing in Europe in 1943 during World War II. Just after meeting the local Hystorian, a bombing raid causes a building collapse that kills the Hystorian and destroys their SQuare, leaving the group with no guidance as to what the break is or how to fix it. Dak and Sera are  forces to travel back to their time to try to get a new SQuare, but instead of finding the Hystorians, the find Tilda, leader of the SQ. While trying to escape teh SQ and warp back to 1943, Dak and Sera inadvertantly take Tilda with them. Now, in addition to trying to figure out and fix the break, they also have to try to stay away from Tilda and the additional danger she brings to their mission.

With a new SQuare in hand, the group learn that this break is the one that led to the SQ rising to power, so it becomes even more important to them to fix this particular break. The break involves a covert mission called Mincement Man which tried to distract the German forces away from the Allied's true target. In order to fix the break, the group must split up. Riq stays in Scotland while Sera goes to Spain and Dak heads to Germany. If the kids can pull this off, the Allies will win the war and the SQ will not rise to power. Can they convince the Germans of Mincement Man's authencity, or will they end up prisoners themselves? Will they be able to stop Tilda, especially now that she has her own time-travel device or will she mess up everything they have fixed and bring on the Cataclysm?

The Iron Empire by James Dashner

Dak, Sera, and Riq have traveled up and down the timeline of history and have finally ended up in Ancient Greece, the site of the Prime Break. If they can fix this break, they will have defeated the SQ and prevented the Cataclysm that ends the world, but in order to do it, they'll need the help of Aristotle, the founding father of the Hystorians. They must stop the assassination of Alexander, heir to the throne and Aristotle's favorite former pupil, and they only have three weeks to stop it; however, as the group is talking with Aristotle, a messenger arrives to announce that Alexander has just been killed by a woman that the time travelers identify as Tilda. Now the kids and Aristotle must travel even farther back in time to try to stop Tilda and the original assassin and save Alexander so that they can prevent the great Cataclysm from destroying the future. Can they fix the Prime Break, and will it really save the future?


Much like Margaret Peterson Haddix's Missing Series all the books in the Infinity Ring series take place around actual historical events, but one of the things I miss in this series that Haddix includes in her series is an author's note giving some factual information about the time period, event, or people. When reading both of these two books, I found myself pulling out my phone to look up details to see if they were factual or fictional. While the factual note isn't necessary to understanding the story, I think it would enhance the reader's experience with the historical side of the historical fiction.

The Select Are Surprised

I finished January with my fifth book of the year, Lost in Babylon, the second book in the Seven Wonders series by Peter Lerangis. The series follows the Select, four 13-year-olds who have the G7W gene that means they are descendants of the royalty of the lost city of Atlantis, but that also means that they will die when they turn 14, unless they find the seven Loculi, orbs that hold the power of Atlantis, that were hidden in the Seven Wonders of the World right before the city of Atlantis sank into the sea. What makes their search even more difficult is that six of the seven Wonders have long since been destroyed.

Lost in Babylon begins with Selects Jack, Aly, and Cass searching for Marco who disappeared with the first Loculus shortly after they recovered it from the Colossus at Rhodes. Each of the Select have an implanted tracking device, but the signal from Marco's device has disappeared, which could mean that he is dead, but when his signal returns and shows that he is somewhere in Iraq, the kids, as well as Professor Beghed, Torquin, and some others from the KI Institute, head to Iraq to find Marco and the Loculus. When they find Marco, they discover that he has found the location of another Loculus, the one that was hidden in the Hanging Gardens in ancient Babylon. The kids travel through a portal at the bottom of the Euphrates river and end up in Ancient Babylon, but they discover that this Babylon is caught in a time rift where time travels 90 times slower than time in the modern world. As the kids work to find and retrieve the Loculus, they meet Daria, a Babylonian slave who has a unique ability to learn languages. They also save the King's son, hunt an ancient sacred beast, the mushushu, join a rebel group, and set off an earthquake that could destroy them all. On top of all this, loyalties are called into question and sacrifices are made.

I started this series because it was billed as part Percy Jackson, part 39 clues. The characters are typical teens (despite their extraordinary abilities): the tech wiz, the nerd, the sports star, and the kid who really doesn't know who he is or what is special about him. Lerangis is very good at keeping the reader pulled into the action and wanting to find out what is going to happen next. This book definitely had some unexpected twists and turns, especially in the final pages, that have me anxiously awaiting the release of book three (Tomb of Shadows set to be released in May of 2014). You can find out more about the books and access lots of extras on the series website http://www.sevenwondersbooks.com/.

I Risked It This Week

This series grabbed me several years ago when I added the first title in the series, Found, to my library's collection, so I was super excited when I saw that the sixth installment in The Missing series by Margaret Peterson Haddix was out. I quickly added it to a book order, and, of course, it was the first title from the order I grabbed to read.

Risked begins with Jonah Skidmore and his sister Katherine doing some computer research trying to figure out which of history's missing children Jonah may be (If this doesn't make sense to you, stop reading this blog immediately and go read the first five books of the series). As they are learning about the Anastasia and Alexei Romonov, children of the last Tsar of Russia, Chip, Jonah's friend and Katherine's kind-of boyfriend, shows up with Daniella, the only one of the missing that was not present in the time cave when Jonah, Chip, and the other 33 Missing learned that they were actually famous children from history who had been kidnapped by Gary and Hodge, two rouge time agents wishing to make a fortune from families in future wishing to adopt these famous children. Unbeknownst to Jonah, Katherine, and Chip (and actually unbeknownst to herself as well) Daniella is working with Gavin, a surly Missing child who has plotted with Gary and Hodge to kidnap the group and take them to the future, but as bad guys often do, they mislead Gavin into actually taking the group back to the very day in 1918 when the whole Romonov family, Daniella's and Gavin's real historical family, were executed. How are Jonah, Katherine, and Chip going to rescue Daniella and Gavin with a dumbed down Elucidator that can only take them to 1918 or make them invisible. To make matters even more difficult, after being rejoined with her tracer and getting all of Anastasia's memories and feelings, Daniella refuses to be rescued without rescuing the rest of the Romonov family.

As with all the books in The Missing Series, Haddix skillfully blends the fictional story of the time travelers with the historical events of the time and family described using the real names of people and places as much as possible. This story kept me guessing the whole time. Being only slightly familiar with the true story of the Romonovs, I knew that most of the Romonov family were killed, so how was Haddix going to complete the story she had woven and still stay true to the historical facts that she always details in the Author's Note at the end of each book. In the end, I was not disappointed. While Haddix did take a bit of poetic license with some of the surviving characters, her fictional account still fit in with the beliefs about the fates of the Romonovs at the time she began writing the story. As always, I loved the story of the books, and I learned a few things about history that I didn't know.

The worst thing about reading a book series that has not been completed is that you have to wait for what seems like an eternity for the next volume to be published (Redeemed is not due out until September 2015), but the good thing about the proliferation of electronic reading devices is the current trend of these series authors releasing electronic short stories to accompany their series. Haddix has thankfully joined this trend with the publication of Sought, a short story that delves more fully into the character Daniella (at least according to the description on Amazon ). I only learned about Sought when looking for the Amazon listing of Risked for this blog. Now I think I'll go download a short story to read.