Jake Black

Spy High - Series Two #5

by A.J. Butcher

Disillusioned with Spy High's methods, Jake chooses to join the Deveraux organisation's secretive Black Ops Division, where the rules don't matter as long as you get the job done. Now, the newly authorised Jake Black must infiltrate a group of apocalyptic terrorists and shut down their mad scheme to destroy the Earth. But Jake's about to find out that if you fight fire with fire, sooner or later you're going to get burned ...JAKE BLACK is the latest full-throttle spy thriller from the author of the brilliant SPY HIGH series. Look out for: EDWARD RED - ANGEL BLUE - BENJAMIN WHITE - CALISTA GREEN - AGENT ORANGE

Genres: Espionage

256 pages, Paperback

First published May 5, 2005

About the author

Andrew James Butcher is the English author of the futuristic teen spy series, Spy High. A.J., who taught English at both Poole Grammar School and Parkstone Grammar School, in Poole, Dorset, and currently teaches at Talbot Heath School in Bournemouth, Dorset took a sabbatical from his teaching career to write Spy High Series Two. He says he has been influenced by Charles Dickens and George Orwell, but that Stan Lee, creator of many of Marvel Comics' super-heroes, is his biggest inspirational figure.

The series is published by Atom Books in the UK and Commonwealth and Little, Brown and Co. in the US. The first series has also been translated into many other languages.

Reviews

[Maria Casey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book has been sitting on my shelf since 2006 (I know because it was written on the price tag) and I wish I'd read it sooner cos it was enjoyable.

[Martin Dagarin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Intresting book, but a little to tipical that Jake's teammates try to save him.

[Nikki Chi · Rating 1 out of 5]

Butcher's attempt at terrorist plots and secret spy activities falls extremely short of the mark. Even with the misty future of 2066 to work with, Butcher's characters inhabit a world that defies governmental logic entirely. Extremely unlikely scenarios in which teenage spies are placed in positions of power are made even more unlikely when people who should be the most paranoid people on the planet--spies, government agents, and terrorists--accept everything at face value and put their trust in whoever comes along. The action scenes were frustrating to anyone that's had a hint of self-defense or martial arts training, with people throwing themselves at one another like football players or zapping each other with guns that somehow send shocks through huge spaces of empty air. An extremely tenuous explanation of antimatter supposedly starts the end of the world in a particle accelerator as people wander around inside it, agents fall huge distances with only a few bruises, and computers can't seem to decide whether they're going to act human or not. What began as a question of ethics versus terrorism ended up as a test of logic and patience.