Ark Angel
 First edition cover | |
| Author | Anthony Horowitz |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Series | Alex Rider series |
| Genre | Adventure, Spy novel, thriller novel |
| Publisher | Puffin Books |
Publication date | 1 April 2005 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 326 |
| ISBN | 0-7445-8324-1 (first edition, paperback) |
| OCLC | 58984041 |
| LC Class | PZ7.H7875 Ar 2005 |
| Preceded by | Scorpia |
| Followed by | Snakehead |
Ark Angel is the sixth book in the Alex Rider series written by British author Anthony Horowitz. The novel is a spy thriller which follows the attempt by the title character, Alex Rider, to foil a plot of a Russian billionaire.
The book was released in the United Kingdom on April 1, 2005[1] and in the United States on April 20, 2006.[2] Initial reviews of the book were positive.
Plot
The book opens with a man named Maximilian Webber, a former SAS man, giving a speech about a terrorist organisation known as Force Three. After the speech he is contacted by an unknown man (the audience is led to believe he is associated with Force Three) who declares him an enemy of Force Three. His phone explodes and kills him instantly.
Meanwhile, Alex is recuperating in the hospital after being shot from his previous mission. One day, he goes down for a walk around the hospital, and sees four men breaking in. One of them interrogates the receptionist and kills him. The group is after Paul Drevin, the son of multimillionaire Nikolei Drevin. Alex manages to overpower the men, but is captured by Kaspar, a man who has a picture of the earth tattooed on his head, and imprisoned in a building, Hornchurch Towers. The Force Three men then set fire to the building after realising that Alex deliberately foiled their plan in catching Paul. Alex manages to escape from the burning building by tightrope walking to an adjacent building and returns back to the hospital, where he is discharged. Later, Nikolei rings him and invites Alex for two weeks, as he is recommended by the doctor to get some rest.
Alex meets Drevin and his unpleasant assistant Tamara Knight. Drevin meets Alex and lets him stay with him, but Alex starts to have his own suspicions about the man when he realises Paul had no guards around that night despite what Drevin had said about him always being a target. Alex is driven to Neverglade, Drevin's castle. He spends time with Paul before stumbling into the man's study. His suspicious grow when he discovers Drevin owns the tower where he was interrogated by Kaspar. Meanwhile, in New York, an organisation disguised as the Creative Ideas Animation (revealed to be a thinly-veiled CIA outpost) meets, with its boss wanting Alex to be brought in, knowing he's a spy. The following day Alex races Drevin around his private go kart track. He beats Drevin by cheating after being infuriated with the man nearly getting him killed. At this point Drevin's hatred of losing is revealed.
Later, Alex watches a match at Stamford Bridge with the home team, Chelsea up against Drevin's football team. Drevin's team loses, however, and Drevin is seen calling someone. Alex notices Silver Tooth, one of the kidnappers earlier, and follows him to the dressing room where Force Three are giving Adam Wright, the footballer who missed the final penalty, a medal. Alex is however taken away by Steel Watch. Alex gets away by making an offensive signal to a Stratford East supporter who, infuriated, tries to punch Alex but he ducks and, instead, the fist hits Steel Watch who accidentally discharges the gun. Alex tries to save Wright by telling Tamara Knight, but Wright is killed when his caesium medal catches on fire.
Drevin, Tamara, Alex and Paul fly to New York, but Alex is apprehended at the airport when his passport seemingly expires. This is quickly exposed as a ruse when CIA chief Joe Byrne arrives to talk to Alex. Byrne reveals Drevin is not who he seems, having got his money through underworld means. Byrne has men at Barbados and wants Alex to report to Byrne if he sees anything amiss at Flamingo Island, Drevin's island from where Ark Angel will be launched.
The action moves to Flamingo Island, where Drevin shows Alex the Head of Security, Mr. Magnus Payne. Paul takes Alex kiteboarding, while Payne tells Drevin who Alex really is. Drevin orders Payne to kill him.
The next day while Alex is being shown a sunken wreck by a guard he is locked inside. Before he runs out of air, Tamara appears and saves him. She is Byrne's inside man. They go up and meet Smithers, and the gadgets he provides to defeat some guards. They also see Force Three but before they can do more they are captured by Mr. Payne.
Alex is taken to Drevin who begins to explain his plan; he intends to bomb Ark Angel and send its wreckage crashing down on the Pentagon in Washington. Doing so will allow him to claim insurance from the disaster (as the project is causing him to lose millions due to going over budget and the increasing difficulty of efficient maintenance), as well as destroy the CIA's evidence of his illegal business practices. Mr. Payne reveals himself to be none other than Kaspar, and Force Three are just hired hands to be scapegoats. He then kills all the members of Force Three, and takes Alex back to his prison, where he explains the plan to an injured Tamara Knight. The next day Alex escapes and meets the CIA halfway there. The CIA storm Flamingo Island and Drevin tries to shoot Alex, but Alex dodges and Paul is hit. Drevin leaves Paul and escapes, but Alex has already tied canoes to the landing skids of the Cessna. Drevin's plane crashes, killing him instantly.
Alex finds out there's no way to stop the bomb remotely so he has to go up to space, to the space station where he finds Kaspar. He fights Kaspar who due to the lack of gravity impales himself on his own knife. Alex moves the bomb meaning that after the detention the wreckage will simply break up and disintegrate instead of crashing into Washington. Ark Angel explodes and Alex falls back to earth and lands 100 miles from Australia .
Characters
Reception
Philip Ardagh at The Guardian gave Ark Angel a positive review, stating "It's perfectly pitched at its readership. Ark Angel reads the way a children's thriller should read" and "This is a welcome new addition [to the series]."[3] However, Joe Queenan of The New York Times gave the book a more negative review. Comparing it to Charlie Higson's Blood Fever, the reviewer criticised Ark Angel for having "zero intellectual content", calling Horowitz's prose style "clunky, uninspiring". He also described Alex as "oddly bland" and "humorless".[4]
References
- ↑ "Ark Angel announced". Anthony Horowitz. Archived from the original on 2009-02-25. Retrieved 2009-09-14.
- ↑ "Ark Angel in the USA". Anthony Horowitz news. February 2006. Retrieved 2009-09-14.
- ↑ Philip Ardagh (9 April 2005). "Alex rides again". The Guardian. Retrieved 2009-04-07.
- ↑ Queenan, Joe (18 June 2006). "Teenage Spy Books by Charlie Higson and Anthony Horowitz". The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-05-11.