Sky Raiders

Wow, amazing world building and a plot that dragged me in and kept my attention when I should have been doing important things, like sleeping. The first chapter was creepy and I didn't think I would read it to my little kids- scary Halloween kidnappers in gruesome costumes, but the rest was great. And Brandon Mull raises stoke questions about what is human and the ability to choose.

I got a copy of this book to review through the Amazon Vine program. I loved Mull's Fablehaven series but wasn't a huge fan of his Beyonders series. I really really enjoyed this first book in his new Five Kingdoms series. This is the first book out of five planned books for this series. The 2nd book in the series will be titled The Rogue Knight and is scheduled for an October 2014 release.

Cole ends up at a creepy Halloween party with some friends. Then things get really strange, Cole and his friends are transported to another world called The Outskirts. The Outskirts are a place between everything and are made up of Five Kingdoms. Cole ends up as a slave for the Sky Raiders. The Sky Raiders loot incredible floating castles that randomly show more appear in the sky. While there he meets a strange girl named Mira. Mira needs Cole’s help and hopefully in return she can help him save his friends from slavery.

The beginning is very creepy, but after that we are introduced to a wonderfully creative world that is full of magic and people who are Shapers...they can shape things to their will. This means the things you run into throughout the book are incredibly unexpected, creative, and intriguing.

From floating castles full of random magical things, to crazy worlds of gigantic food and scary plastic dinosaurs...there are just a ton of neat ideas and crazy things in this world.

The book features both a girl and a boy as the primary characters, so I think readers of either gender will be able to relate to the story well. I enjoyed the characters too. Cole is somewhat clueless at the beginning of the story, but he is also brave and loyal. He is easy to engage with and a good role model. Mira is the main heroine and she is a fascinating character as well. I really enjoyed reading about them both. We meet some other side characters along the way and all of them are well done and entertaining.

There is a lot of action and adventure and the story was very engaging and hard to put down. Reading about Cole scavenging treasure from all of these crazy floating castles was a lot of fun. The world is incredibly detailed and there is so much more to learn about it in future books. I really really loved it.

Overall I really enjoyed this book, it features a wonderfully creative world with engaging and likable characters. There is a lot of action, adventure, and magic. I liked this book much better than his Beyonders series. Whether or not I like it was much as his Fablehaven series (which is one of my absolute favorite middle grade fantasy series) remains to be seen. I highly recommend this book to fans of middle grade fantasy, it was a fantastic read. I can’t wait to read The Rogue Knight when it releases in October. show less

Big disappointment after Fablehaven. I loved Fablehaven. What is this garbled mess of five kingdoms, all different, somewhere out there, yet somehow connected to earth? One kingdom is a cross between wakefulness and dreaming. Another is between life and death. What? This book had me so confused, I just wanted to curse Brandon Mull so that he could never write another book. Seriously. Shaper? What is that? A person who can create anything they want? Why do people from earth have better than average shaping skills in this weird place that I don't understand? Believe me. I did read this book, and I am so confused. Fablehaven was easy, fun and downright addicting. This is garbage. No idea why it gets good ratings. But I can tell you that show more sequels talk. With every book that follows, readership falls off dramatically.

Here's a little bit more about this crazy plot. Cole and his friends are in a haunted house when a guy asks them if they want to see the really scary part. They all say yes, and before you know it Cole's friends are forced into a hole that doesn't seem to have a bottom. Cole escapes, but then decides he has to go after his friends. Another girl escapes too and she's supposed to go after help, but she never enters the story again. Lame. Why bother to have her character at all.

Cole jumps into the hole and when he comes out there's a guy who says he's in a place called the Outskirts and his friends are now slaves, but he is a free agent and he needs to get a tattoo that says so. What? He goes after his friends and he's caught immediately. Lame. They give him the slave tattoo and he's sold to the Sky Raiders. Sky Raiders work at the brink. The brink is the edge of the Outskirts. No one has ever returned from the brink. It's like a pit with no bottom. You will fall forever.

Sky Raiders raid castles that float. You have to get in, scavenge what you can, and get out. It's dangerous because you don't know what's going to be there. It could be deserted or it could be inhabited by creatures that try to kill you. There may even be semblances which are people who aren't real. I think they are like the people in your dreams. They seem real. Maybe? I think? I really need help here. This book was too much for me.

From here it just keeps going further into the brink. Mira is also a Sky Raider. It turns out that she is one of the five daughters of the king who is presumed dead. She is a shaper. Her family comes from a long line of powerful shapers. But it looks like it skipped a generation with her dad. So he fakes his daughters deaths and steals their shaping gift, because if they die the ability dies with them, but alive, their gift can be stolen. What? Lame. Mira escaped and has been hiding out with the Sky Raiders, but no one knows this until she finally tells Cole. Now she's been discovered and her father is sending out an army to bring her back. Well, she flees, along with Cole and two other Sky Raider kids.

So I'm just going to jump to the end, because trust me, it only keeps going more downhill. Mira gets her shaping power back, but not before it somehow gains the ability to exist outside of a person and terrorizes the kingdom. What?? Craziest plot in the history of plots. Cole never does find his earth friends again. But guess what? Read the next book and maybe he will. Or not. This book had no semblance of closure. It jumped into the brink as far as I'm concerned. Ironically, that doesn't make me want to read the next book. It makes me want to run as fast as I can back to Fablehaven, never to set foot in the Outskirts again. show less

4.5 stars

One of my biggest fans in the world of me, one of the sons of a friend of my wife, enthusiastically recommended this book to me. Not wanting him to think that I'm the grumpy old man that I am, I decided to take his offer and read the book.

Astounding. The book was wildly creative and though the book moved in typical zero to hero fashion, I enjoyed the world that Brandon Mull created.

The book starts in my back yard of Mesa, AZ and the kids get tricked into going to the Outskirts a place of adventure, an evil king, and people who can shape reality.

Cole goes to a normal school in Mesa, Arizona and has a crush on Jenna Hunt. He lives a normal life. That was until Halloween when he and his best friend Dalton went into a haunted house. It was haunted. Cole and his friends are sucked through a portal into a different world the Outskirts. Cole is sold as a slave to the Sky Raiders, people scavenging prizes from floating islands. Cole meets Twitch, Jace, and Mira. Legionnaires come looking for Mira who tells her friends that she is a princess and is very wanted by her evil father, the King. Mira's powers were stolen by him then lost and made into Carnag. They defeat Carnag and Mira gets her powers back.
I love this book. It is a mix between fantasy and science. There are technologically show more advanced places, magical places, illusionary towns, skyscrapers, and dilapidated shacks. Brandon Mull probably had me in mind when he wrote this. Sky Raiders is not my favorite in the series, but it's still pretty great. show less

I thought this was a super fun read. I loved learning more about this world. I really liked how this world was mix of both science fiction and fantsay. This book was super fast pace and engaging and the narrator was super not what i accepted. I really liked the fast pace nature of this read. I liked the various enviroments that we had. I also grew to love the character and will def read mroe books in this series. This series did not wow me lack fablehaven, but a soild read!!

I thought this was a super fun read. I loved learning more about this world. I really liked how this world was mix of both science fiction and fantsay. This book was super fast pace and engaging and the narrator was super not what i accepted. I really liked the fast pace nature of this read. I liked the various enviroments that we had. I also grew to love the character and will def read mroe books in this series. This series did not wow me lack fablehaven, but a soild read!!