Sabotage on the Solar Express (Adventures on Trains Book 5)

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I highly recommend this series, Adventures on Trains - each book contains so much excitement! If you enjoy books full of mystery, suspense, twists and turns, these books are ideal for you! I love that every book has a different setting. Each one extremely difficult to put down until you have solved the mystery (or tried to!). A high-speed train journey worth catching . . .The best yet' – The Times on Murder on the Safari Star

This story is honestly so much fun, exciting technology, sabotage, and a runaway train. What more could you possibly want? We are over the moon with how neat and tidy the job was and felt really involved with all the decisions with the locations and installations of the panels and the inverter and battery. A thrilling and hugely entertaining adventure story’ – David Walliams on The Highland Falcon Thief, the first book in the series. I loved all the science bits, and the idea of a train that runs on solar power and water, essentially. Boaz is a great character, he’s enthusiastic and knowledgeable. I loved him so much. I love his family too, they’re supportive, but also down to earth. Author Anna Kemp introduces The Hollow Hills, the sequel to her dark magical tale, Into Goblyn Wood.The authors have given so much adventure and so many twists to support the very likeable characters, and yes, that includes Marianne. Boaz comes across as a down to earth young man who is very aware of the eco message that all young children are aware of. Can Uncle Nat keep Hal safe? He doesn't seem to have much choice but to go along with teh children's adventures! If you haven’t yet hopped onto this train ride, I urge you to do so. These are brilliant adventures for readers young and old. Moving the action to Australia, the by now slightly famous boy sleuth Hal and his caring - slightly mysterious (and for me, inappropriately crushworthy) Uncle Nat are taking a VIP inaugural test trip on a special hydrogen powered test train. Hal will need all of his wits and bravery to figure out who wants the train to fail - and possibly kill everyone on board!

Whenever anyone asks for chapter book recommendations for independent readers, M.G. Leonard and Sam Sedgman’s marvellous ‘Adventures on Trains’ series is my absolute list topper. I love that this winning team of authors have created exciting, accessible and non-gender divisive reads for the next generation of bookworms who are hungry for compelling reads but not quite ready for the darkness of the later Harry Potter or Nevermoor books. All-aboard for the fourth amazing journey in the bestselling Adventures on Trains series from M. G. Leonard and Sam Sedgman, illustrated throughout by Elisa Paganelli.The style as always is clear, and readable, with the characters well drawn (literally and narratively) with an interesting central mystery - although as I mentioned there is more action here, so there is more reacting than discovering than in previous entries. A mysterious letter from an old friend asks Hal and Uncle Nat to help investigate a spooky supernatural mystery. Legend has it the Kratzensteins, a family of rich and powerful railway tycoons, are cursed, but there is no such thing as a curse, is there . . .? Hal and Nate continue to be excellent lead characters. It's also lovely to see how their relationship has evolved and how much Nate trusts Hal, both as a person but also as a detective. Hal is brilliantly smart, and continues to show how his talent for noticing things is the key to solving the crime - normally aided by his excellent drawing skills! And it really is hard to talk about these books without mentioning the fantastic illustrations by Elisa Paganelli - they help set the scene. Also, Hal's habit of drawing everyone is very helpful in keeping all the characters straight ;) If you have a kid who has been enjoying the Adventures on Trains series, or who just loves trains in general, then this will be a great addition to their shelves. Adult train nerds will almost certainly love it as well and will probably learn something from it too—I found myself sending many did-you-know texts as I read—so don’t discount this one as a potential Father’s Day gift later this year.

Epic Adventures is a short, non-fiction book that explores twelve great train journeys you can take from across the world. Nearly every continent is featured (unsurprisingly, there are no railways in Antarctica just yet) with fascinating facts shared about the countries and cultures, flora, and fauna that surrounds these journeys. We also got a revisit from a past character in Marianne (well, and August, but I'm not counting him!) and it was great to see the relationship between her and Hal as a result of the events of the second book. Once a week or so had passed and decided to go for it, we put a deposit down on the Monday, and the installation was completed on the Thursday with the roofers and the Friday with the electrician. David Almond introduces his new picture book, A Way to the Stars, a story about perseverance and finding a way to make dreams come true.Sabotage on the Solar Express can be read as a stand-alone novel, or enjoyed as part of the Adventures on Trains series. Join Hal and Uncle Nat on more stops in this thrilling series with: The Highland Falcon Thief, Kidnap on the California Comet, Murder on the Safari Star, and Danger at Dead Man's Pass. Sabotage on the Solar Express is set in Australia and concerns a train driven by hydrogen and solar power, an invention from the mind of a brilliant child genius. But not everybody is happy with this and, as the journey unfolds, so does the sabotage. Accompanied by Elisa Paganelli's delicious artwork, so precise and clean with detail, Sabotage on the Solar Express rolls on with utter aplomb. Bestselling author Alexandra Christo, author of TikTok sensation To Kill a Kingdom, introduces her new book, The Night Hunt (Hot Key Books), a dark... The Adventures on Trains series is one of my favourite discoveries of the past few years. I really cannot stress enough how brilliant they are. I really thought that they couldn’t possibly get any better, but Sabotage on the Solar Express somehow managed it!