Blade (Out of the Shadows, Playing Dead) is trying to expose the very people he has worked for as a hired killer during most of his life. As in the first two books, the gritty underworld--the only world Blade has ever known--emerges through his stark, terse internal monologue. The story's bleak ending, though jarring, fits with the character.

Gr 3-6--An oversized overview of animals that inhabit and/or utilize burrows the world over. The highly varied mammals, insects, reptiles, and amphibians are organized according to habitat: woodland, arctic, forest, grassland, and desert. Curiously, an ocean/sea habitat is not represented while the redundant "forest" and "woodland" headings are. Cutaway and fold-out pages are well done and add substantially to the presentation. Each creature's picture is accompanied by a short (two-to-four sentence) explanation of how it uses a burrow. Facts are presented in a clear, scientific manner, but some of the identifying labels are difficult to read. While the information is accurate, the book's focus is extremely narrow, and readers may find themselves thirsting for more general knowledge about the scaly pangolin or the beautifully striped and spotted serval. Still others may find that they are getting more than they ever wanted to know about burrows. What at first appears to be an eye-catching format soon becomes a cluttered jumble of esoteric facts housed in a cumbersome book.--Lisa Wu Stowe, Great Neck Library, NY