Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

Alex Rider, """"the world's only teenaged secret agent,"""" embarks on a third adventure in Skeleton Key by Anthony Horowitz. This time out, the British teen goes undercover as a ball boy at Wimbledon in the first stage of an assignment that leads to a showdown with a dastardly villain armed with nuclear weapons.

School Library Journal

Gr 5-10-Fans of Horowitz's Stormbreaker (2001) and Point Blank (2002, both Philomel), and newcomers to the series alike, will not be disappointed with this rip-roaring escapade featuring the 14-year-old spy. Trying to return to a "normal" life as a schoolboy after a mere four weeks since his last MI6 adventure, Alex Rider is recruited right off the soccer field to check out some suspicious goings-on at Wimbledon. This assignment catapults him into a series of life-threatening episodes, such as coming face to face with a great white shark, dodging bullets as he dives off a burning boat, and being tied to a conveyor belt that is moving toward the jaws of a gigantic grindstone in an abandoned sugar factory. Soon the teen is single-handedly taking on his most dangerous enterprise yet. His mission is nothing short of saving the world from a nuclear attack, engineered by the psychopathic and egomaniacal former commander of the Russian army. Alex is armed only with a few specially designed gadgets, which are disarmingly age-appropriate: a Gameboy that doubles as a Geiger counter, a cell phone whose aerial shoots out a drugged needle that is activated by pressing 999, a Tiger Woods figurine that doubles as a small grenade when its head is twisted just so. This page-turning thriller leaves readers breathless with anticipation. When at last Alex returns home, his love interest, Sabina Pleasure, asks where he has been. "Well, I was, sort of- busy," he replies in a classic, understated, James Bond kind of way.-Elizabeth Fernandez, Brunswick Middle School, Greenwich, CT Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

ALA Booklist

Is there a single innovative moment in this graphic adaptation of Anthony Horowitz's third novel of teen super-spy Alex Rider? Not really, no. From the "pre-credits" sequence to the Bondian gadgets, from the megalomaniacal villain with a penchant for explaining things to the nuclear bomb defusing climax, even the most inexperienced spy-fiction reader is likely to see what's coming next. Does the adaptation contain any real substance or insight? Oh, come now. When the orphaned 14-year-old notes that he may lack a proper family but at least he gets to sun himself in five-star hotels, you can rest assured they've given up human drama in favor of bang-up action set-pieces. Does it have a place in your collection? Absolutely. It will be much enjoyed by those looking for a lightweight adventure with a high body count, a propulsive (though wordy) plot, and well-choreographed action rendered in capable illustration. Such readers might also be directed to Charlie Higson's more thoughtful and involving Young Bond series, which is due to be adapted into graphic-novel form in 2010.

Horn Book

Fourteen-year-old spy Alex Rider is once again called upon to assist Great Britain's intelligence agency. Alex is sent to an island near Cuba to observe a former Russian general who plans to detonate a nuclear device in order to restore communism to the world. As in previous episodes, the plot is intentionally preposterous, but the novel offers nonstop action, pulse-pounding suspense, and a playfully entertaining twist ending.