Skip to main content

"City Spies"

Written by James Ponti

       
Image Source: thriftbooks.com
        "City Spies" begins by meeting twelve year old Sara, an orphan that was imprisoned for hacking New York City's computers to expose her foster parents. Sara has been offered to join Britain's MI6 a kid agent rather than staying in juvie for the remainder of her sentence. She is joined by a cast of four other kids agents with their own specialties and code names. Kat is the crytographer, Rio is the master at sleight of hand, Paris is the survival specialist, Sydney is the field ops specialist and Sara, code name Brooklyn, is the computer hacker. As for their mission, they must compete in an environmental innovation competition for kids and place in the top 10 so they can protect the sponsor of the competition.
        This books is often highly recommended to older elementary students by one of my coworkers at the library so I was eager to read it. I found it to be appropriate for older elementary aged children and that the friendships built throughout were wonderful. It was easy to read, fast paced and filled with believable dialogue. The story and characters were engaging and refreshingly included a diverse group of kids. I was surprised to read many different reviews that claimed the book did not have much action. Kirkus review even believe it did not "live up to its potential". However, the success of this series shows that just because reviewers think that it doesn't live up to expectations does not mean that children won't love it! With six books in the series it is safe to say that kids find the series to be entertaining and worth while. 
        

Ponti, James. City Spies. Aladdin, 2020. 367 pages. TR. $8.99, ISBN 978-1-5344-1492-1.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Let's get reading!

Welcome!  I will be using this blog to respond to and evaluate children's books for the LIS 721 Library Materials for Children class for Fall 2025. I really enjoyed and learned so much in the Materials for Young Adults class and hope to do the same in this class. Happy reading!
Post a Comment
Read more

"A Different Pond"

Written by Bao Phi                    Illustrated by Thi Bui Image Source: Amazon           The illustrations in "A Different Pond"  are almost all darker richer tones to depict the darkness of the hour that the Dad and the boy are up at. When there is light it is a deep yellow to show the warmth and comfort of their home, but also representing their lights without lamp shades to help diffuse the light in the house, as a lampshade is an extravagance for them. Thi does a wonderful job of using tones of blue and brown to shade the environment and shadows around the father and son that adds a beautiful depth to the images but also adds to the symbolism of the weight that the father feels everyday when he is fishing so that their family can eat.          The text in this book is appropriate for the children reading it and is a credible conversation. "A Different Pond" is a real...
Post a Comment
Read more

"A Little Like Magic"

Written and Illustrated by Sarah Kurpiel Image Source: readbrightly.com           The illustrations in "A Little Like Magic"  use a whimsical cool color scheme to help show the cold of the winter as they journey out in the cold. There are touches of warm colors when looking through windows into the warm house, as well as her toy horse to represent the warmth and comfort they bring. The full-page spreads that show the mother and child outside during the day use muted cool colors, while the full-page spreads at night use deeper, richer cool colors. Sarah does a wonderful job using lines to help show movement and the cold wind. The lines also help keep the eye moving throughout the spreads.          The text in this book is appropriate for the children reading it as it is simple and most of the language is vocabulary they would have heard before. Each page has one to three sentences. Repetition is used when the main character revi...
Post a Comment
Read more