Title: Stormbreaker
Author: Anthony Hororwitz
Number of Pages: 234 pages
Genre: Mystery
Summary:
This book is about Alex Rider who is a strong, tall, athletic, 14 year
old boy, who has a certain set of physical skills that he never wants to use,
but eventually has to use in a tough situation.
Other characters in the book are Herod Sayle, the antagonist; Mr.
Blunt, a spy; Mrs. Jones, the spy director and also an aid to Alex; Ian Rider,
Alexs dead uncle; Mr. Grin, an assistant to Herod; Nadia Vole, another
assistant to Herod; Yassen Gregorovich, a Russian assassin; and Smithers,
the guy who works for the agency who supplied Alex with his tools and
gadgets.
The story takes place at Herod Sayles mansion which is also a secret
Base, Alexs house, and at the Royal and General Bank during present times.
In the beginning of the book, Alex is woken up at 3:00 a.m. and told
that his uncle, Ian Rider had died. At the funeral, Alex is approached by
strange men from the bank agency his uncle worked for. Alex is suspicious
and investigates the bank. He finds out theyre a spy agency. Alex is blackmailed into replacing is uncle as a spy. Alex goes through a tough training
course at which he is bullied for being 14 years old where all the other boys
are older. After he completes the course, he meets Smithers who gives him
special gadgets and tools for his mission to find out what Herod Sayle is
secretly planning. Smithers gives Alex a yo-yo that has nylon instead of
thread and the yo-yo can electrically contract the cord. He also gives Alex a
Gameboy video game that is really a device that can detect bugs, relay
information to the spy agency, see through any surface two inches thick,
listen in on conversations, and it can remotely set off a smoke bomb. The
last thing Mr. Smithers gives to Alex is a zit cream that melts through
metal. Then, Alex is sent out to Herod Sayles mansion to pretend to be
Felix Lester a child who recently won a contest to meet Herod Sayle.
In the middle of the book, Alex meets Mr. Grin a man that had cut his
face and lost his tongue doing a knife throwing circus trick. Upon arrival at
the mansion, Alex finds a piece of paper with a weird drawing of some sort in
the bedroom where his uncle Ian Rider had stayed. He relays the
information to the agency with the Gameboy. Later, escorted by Nadia Vole,
an assistant of Herod Sayle, he tries out the new Stormbreaker computer to
see how it works and operates. He thinks it is amazing. Then, he secretly
walks through the mansion searching for clues and evidence. He finds a door
and he uses his Gameboy device to listen in. He hears that Mr. Grin is going
to be leading some sort of delivery at 2:00 am the next day. Alex also finds
out that his late uncle, Ian Rider often went to the library and he often
snooped about. At 2:00 am the next day Alex sees a bunch of trucks that
are getting ready to leave. He hops unnoticed into the back of the truck
with Nadia Vole and Mr. Grin inside. When they arrive, a submarine peeks
out of the water and the Russian assassin Yassen Gregoravich climbs out. He
then starts to transport metal containers into the trucks. After they finish
they started driving back and Alex hops in again. In the morning Alex is
offered the chance to stroll in the park when he is attacked. He fights the
people off but, now he knows that Herod Sayle had planned for Alex to die.
Next, Alex remembers that Herod Sayle had mentioned about his uncle
going to the library often. So, Alex goes to library and the librarian who
remembered Ian Rider, shows Alex the books he had checked out. Alex took
out the note from the bedroom. It had a number on it, a page number. Alex
flips to the page about the history of a local, now abandoned mineshaft. The
page had a map on it. Alex held the note up to the map and it reveals a route
of some sort through the abandoned mine.
At the end of the book, Alex walks through the mine and finds part of
Herod Sayles testing facilities for Stormbreakers. There were
loudspeakers calling out for people to go to the bio-decontamination center.
Alex wonders why they would need decontamination for computers.
Suddenly, a guard calls out to Alex yelling for him to stop. He grabs Alex
and knocks him out. Alex wakes up handcuffed to a radiator and he is being
questioned by Herod Sayle. Alex buckles and spills everything: the spy
agency, who he really is, and how much he knows. Herod Sayle says the
reason they had the decontamination was because of a variation of smallpox
Sayle had created that would be able to spread faster and kill faster. That
is what is in the Stormbreakers. Alex now realizes that when the Prime
Minister gets the honor of turning on the Stormbreakers (that will be in
every single classroom in England), he will really be releasing a gas that will
kill an entire generation in England. Herod Sayle explains that he was bullied
as a child and feels that in turn by releasing this gas he will get his revenge.
Herod Sayle dismisses himself to watch the prime minister turn on all the
Stormbreakers. Alex is left to die when Nadia tricks him into falling into a
pool of jellyfish with tentacles that could kill Alex. He escapes by applying
the zit cream to the metal borders of the pool and letting the water and
jellyfish flood out. He grabs a harpoon gun attaches it to the yo-yo nylon
cord and fires it at another escaping airplane being piloted by Mr. Grin. He
gets into the plane and threatens to shoot Mr. Grin if he doesnt fly to
where the prime minister is going to turn on the Stormbreakers. When,
theyre over the building Alex plants a smoke bomb, grabs a parachute and
jumps out of the plane. Alex sets off the smoke bomb and the plane crashes
and goes up in flames. Alex makes it just in time to stop the prime minister
from turning on the Stormbreakers.
Reaction:
On a scale of one to ten, I would give this book a nine because the
author does a very good job of creating mystery between Herod Sayle and
the Stormbreakers. At times it seemed that Herod Sayle was a good guy
just giving his gifts to England and sometimes he seemed crazy trying to kill
an entire generation in England.
My favorite part of the book was when Alex jumps out of the plane
because it seems like the climax. Will he get to the ceremony for turning on
the Stormbreakers in time or will England lose an entire generation?
A person who likes spies, mysteries, and a good ending to a book
should definitely read this.
