The 39 Clues: The Maze of Bones

With J.K. Rowling having sent HARRY POTTER out to pasture, Scholastic needs a new kid-lit cash cow. So it created one — or at least that’s the hope — with THE 39 CLUES.

Even if you have no children, you may be aware of the hype: a planned series of 10 books, with different authors taking turns at the helm, beginning with Rick Riordan. There’s an interactive component with trading cards and a website, with more than $100,000 in prizes up for grabs. No less than Steven Spielberg has already snapped up the movie rights. But will grade-schoolers snap up the first book, THE 39 CLUES: THE MAZE OF BONES?

The gist of it and the entire franchise is spelled out in the opening pages. Cahill matriarch Grace has died, leaving behind a vast fortune. At her funeral, her executor invites select family members to view a message from the departed. She tells them the Cahill name is the most powerful in the world, and that power can be harnessed via 39 clues she’s planted all over the globe? You can either take a million-dollar settlement and walk away; or you can give that up and risk your life by taking clue #1.

A few choose the latter, including Grace’s orphaned grandchildren, Amy and Dan. Given the rules of children’s stories and happy endings, we can safely assume they’ll be the victors when all is said and done, but the point is to follow them along this danger-laden treasure hunt. Not long after the siblings have started sleuthing, someone tries to off them via a fire, and then a bomb, with more traps and tricks along the way, including the titular skeleton-strewn catacombs.

Their journey takes them first to Philadelphia, then to France, as they flee greedy distant relatives, a mysterious man in black and, most perilously, social services. With the help of their au pair, the brother-and-sister act has to use its collective knowledge, library skills, Internet expertise and — at one point — iPod technology to crack the codes and move on.

And that they do, until the book just ends, in the same style as the old cinema serials. Book two, ONE FALSE NOTE, hits in December, and the third, THE SWORD THIEF, follows in April 2009, with the remainder strewn out until Sept. 2010. Hopefully for Scholastic, its target market won’t have outgrown the adventures before then.

Many already have dubbed it THE DA VINCI CODE for kids, but shorn of religious conspiracies and driven by facts surrounding the history of Benjamin Franklin, I think it plays more like a junior-varsity NATIONAL TREASURE. Riordan does well in keeping the story moving quickly from one scenario to another, but the overall plot has a major hole with competing teams showing up at places they wouldn’t be able to, not being privy to the same info Amy and Dan are.

Eagle eyes will spot unusual things going on in the design of some of the book’s pages, no doubt clues you’ll need to complete the website’s missions. Helping with those are the trading cards, six of which are encased in a hidey-hole accessible via the inside front cover.

I’m not sure how I feel about a series whose creation and authorship lies more with a marketing committee than an individual writer. One senses commerce trumps art in such an undertaking. But kids aren’t stupid — if they’re not hooked by the story of THE 39 CLUES, they’ll quit playing … and reading. Funny though it may seem, I kinda wanna know where it goes from here. —Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.

OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF THIS AUTHOR:
• REBEL ISLAND by Rick Riordan

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