Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2973236 in Books
• Published on: 2004-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Spies are great currency for exciting storylines, but few authors manage to successfully concoct realistic scenarios for a willing readership expecting chases, gunshots and thrills aplenty. In the first of what could easily become his most memorable series of novels to date, Anthony Horowitz has added a tongue-in-cheek quality to Stormbreaker that lifts it above several others in the same genre.

Horowitz knows that his main character, 14-year-old Alex Rider, is a normal teenager and he never forgets this when he thrusts his young hero into the thick of several truly edge-of-seat scenarios. There is humour alongside the action too--some great characters and cutting one-liners--that helps to ensure that entertainment is high on the agenda throughout.

Orphan Alex thought he knew his Uncle Ian Rider--until the elusive banker is killed in a tragic car accident. Immediately, Alex's life starts to get stranger by the day as his guardian's friends and colleagues start showing up and contradicting everything Alex thought he knew about the man he'd called Dad for so long. Maybe Ian Rider was not a banker after all? Surely the bullet holes in his Uncle's totalled car reveal that he had not died in an accident, but was murdered? Everything is explained when Alex decides to track down Ian Rider's real employers, but Alex is in for a surprise when they decide to contact him. The truth is hard to take, but maybe by following in his uncle's secret footsteps he might get the chance for revenge.

Apart from a slightly over-the-top finale involving a helicopter and the roof of London's Science Museum, Stormbreaker is a refreshingly energetic yarn that is required reading for fans of the contemporary thriller. --John McLay

Customer Reviews

alex rider
This was a really fun book that I will recommend on to many readers, young and old alike. I had heard many good things about Anthony Horowitz and I was not to be disappointed. His pace of storyline is excellent and his characters are wonderfully developed. The villains are as colourful as any created by Ian Fleming and the background for the evil plot was well thought out. The actual diabolic plan and described results were in fact highly unrealistic, but that did not matter one iota to this gold nugget of a story. I read the entire book in about three and a half hours and will be quick to go and find the subsequent volumes in the series.

weird
after hearing all the hype over this book and the fact they made it a movie, i decided to give it a try...

i have now read all the alex rider books and this seems to be the worst of them all

i think the gadgets ruined it...but maybe that is just me

Very enjoyable but could of been longer.
I really enjoyed this book but found that it could of been fleshed out more as the premise was good and all the characters were interesting. As an adult reading it I could be missing out on the fact that its aimed at children and therefore a perfect length but Harry Potter is also meant for children and was much more detailed. I think as a whole the book was good and I would probably read another in the series but would hope for a more detailed story in the next one otherwise I would give up reading any more.