The Explorers: The Door in the Alley by Adrienne Kress

HI there!

Welcome back to Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers.

Today, we're shining the spotlight on a NEW Middle Grade series via Delcorte Press.  The series is called The Explorers, and if book one is any indication of what we're in store for...it's gonna be SO GOOD!  So, if you'll please follow me with the utmost urgency, it's time to embark on today's adventure through the pages with our book of choice...

The Explorers:

The Door in the Alley

by

Adrienne Kress

9781101940051

Delacorte Press

About the book...

Featuring a mysterious society, a secretive past, and a pig in a teeny hat, The Explorers: The Door in the Alley is the first book in a new series for fans of The Name of This Book Is a Secret and The Mysterious Benedict Society. Knock once if you can find it—but only members are allowed inside. 
 
   This is one of those stories that start with a pig in a teeny hat. 

It’s not the one you’re thinking about. 

(This story is way better than that one.) 

   This pig-in-a-teeny-hat story starts when a very uninquisitive boy stumbles upon a very mysterious society. After that, there is danger and adventure; there are missing persons, hired thugs, a hidden box, a lost map, and famous explorers; and there is a girl looking for help that only uninquisitive boys can offer.

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Oh me oh my...where to begin!

Well, as it says, we begin with a pig in a teeny hat (SO CUTE!), escalate to tree houses with glass floors (hope you're not afraid of heights), drop once more to the deepest depths of exploration (we're talking SUPER deep here), and finally settle in somewhere around "oh-there-you-are-slightly-happy-ever-after" and "OMG-how-can-you-leave-them-like-THAT" pandemonium (no subtext needed there).  Yes, my friends, you're in for one heck of an adventure, whether you want it or not...and our leading man certainly did NOT want it, no siree.  Lotta choice he had...

Seriously, once things get started, there's no stopping this runaway train...and I mean that in the best way possible.  Though the children's tales start off completely parallel to one another, they converge in a most unexpected way that completely blows the lid off of all the oddities we've already digested and begs us to have not simply a second helping, but a third, or fourth even!  Sebastian was a doll, even if he preferred everything just so.  It was so much fun watching him try to break his own glass house, so to speak, and succeed in such a spectacular fashion.  Evie was so much more than just another orphaned girl, not that they are so common place to begin with.  She had fire and spunk, the will to do what needs to be even if it IS outside the lines...a great yang to our boy Seb's yin, if I do say so myself.  The trials and tribulations they've been through, though many, are nothing compared to the ones they are about to go through, but they will make them that much stronger, wiser, and more adept at uncovering things that don't want to be uncovered.

In closing, I leave you with my most accurate then AND now reaction to the final moments of the book...

How could you? After all those pages of gunfights, life threatening peril, and animals in tiny hats! How could you just... you know... and really what about... ugh! Where is book 2...I need book 2

...indeed.

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About the author...

Adrienne Kress is a writer and an actress born and raised in Toronto. She is the daughter of two high school English teachers, and credits them with inspiring her love of both writing and performing. She also has a cat named Atticus, who unfortunately despises teeny hats. She is the author of The Explorers: The Door in the Alley and The Explorers: The Reckless Rescue. To find out more about Adrienne go to AdrienneKress.com and follow @AdrienneKress on Twitter and Instagram

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Special thanks to Joshua at Random House Children's Publishing for the ARC for review. (THANKS!)  For more information on this title, the author, the series, or the publisher, feel free to click through the links provided above. This title hit bookstore shelves late April 2017 via Delacorte Press, an imprint of RHCB, so be on the lookout for it near you!

Until next time, remember...if it looks good, READ IT!