Book Review: Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces

Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces 

Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency series, #5

written by Iain Reading

222 pages // published in 2015 // young adult adventure

BOOK DESCRIPTION

Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces is the eagerly anticipated fifth instalment of the Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency book series. This series features the intrepid teenage seaplane pilot and amateur detective Kitty Hawk as she continues in the footsteps of Nancy Drew and Amelia Earhart on her epic flight around the world.

After meeting up with an old friend in the eternal city of Rome, Kitty Hawk unexpectedly stumbles (almost literally) into a bizarre mystery involving creepy disembodied voices, secret hidden rooms, unbreakable mathematical codes, ominous chain-smoking strangers and an array of plundered artworks by such famous masters as Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro and Vincent van Gogh - all of it wrapped up and entwined in an enigmatic riddle hanging in plain sight right in front of everyone's noses.

With the help of friends both old and new, Kitty Hawk follows a trail of cryptic clues that leads her on a breathless tour across a quintessentially European landscape - from ancient Roman Italy to the darkest corners of Germany, Austria and beyond.

As with the previous books in the series, this new installment is perfect for firing the imaginations of readers of all ages. Filled with fascinating and highly Google-able locations and history, this exhilarating adventure will have armchair explorers and amateur detectives alike anxiously following every twist and turn as they attempt to help Kitty Hawk try and solve the extraordinarily bizarre Mystery of the Masterpieces.

My Review...



Another fun installment in the Kitty Hawk series. Upon arrival in Rome, Kitty stumbles into another big mystery. One that spans back to World War II, and prompts a visit to some other European cities of interest.

I was thrilled with the idea of this mystery from the get-go. There's riddles, coded messages on the radio, and priceless art that appears where it shouldn't be. I also loved how she got to meet up with secret investigators on the same track that she's on, and gets to work alongside them. Pretty cool!

Kitty has a upbeat and determined attitude, and I like her for it. She sees what needs to be done to figure out the riddles, and sets her mind figure it out.

Because of the historical intrigue, I think almost any age could enjoy this book. I felt that the plot kept me on my toes while I read, and I might have learned some fresh tidbits from international history. It was great to get to visit Rome "up-close" with Kitty and see how she experienced it with her friend Charlie (which you may remember from book 1).

Really, it is a fun book! I hope there will be more books in the Kitty Hawk series one day.

Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces is available on Amazon in paperback and e-book format.

About the Author:

Iain Reading is passionate about Root Beer, music, and writing. He is Canadian, but currently resides in the Netherlands working for the United Nations. Iain is the author of the Kitty Hawk Flying Detective Agency Series, the dragon of the month club, and The Wizards of Waterfire Series. To learn more, go to Iain’s Website, Twitter, Amazon, and Goodreads.

Excerpt from Kitty Hawk and the Mystery of the Masterpieces:

PROLOGUE

There Has To Be A Rationale Explanation…

It was the creepiest thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life.

With my skin crawling with goose bumps, I listened as the psychopathic tinkling song of a child’s music box quickly faded into the high-pitch hiss of static and was quickly replaced by a sound that brought new meaning to the phrase of having one’s blood run cold. My knees literally went weak at just the sound of it, threatening to collapse under me like watery rubber.

.... my mind raced to find some explanation for the completely bizarre and otherworldly sounds that I was hearing. There has to be a rational explanation for this. This is real life, not a horror movie. There has to be something that somehow explains this!

These were all reasonable assumptions, of course, but what I was hearing was so completely fantastical that it seemed to defy all attempts at finding a sensible or logical explanation.

I closed my eyes for an instant as the room began to swim dizzily out of focus around me. My heart was beating so fast that my brain was simply overwhelmed by sensory input and it took me a second or two to recover from the wave of sudden lightheaded vertigo that had washed over me.

This can’t be happening, I told myself. Of course it was happening, but my brain simply refused to accept that it was real and the resulting disorientation made me feel like my entire world had suddenly been turned upside down, leaving me confused and struggling to find solid ground.

But I was determined to find my feet again.

Just breathe, I told myself as I took a very deep breath, which instantly began to make me feel a little bit more in control. I slowly exhaled and opened my eyes again, repeating this thought over and over like a mantra until I finally began to get a hold of myself.

Already feeling much better, I forced myself to take another breath and concentrate on exactly what it was that I was hearing. It was a voice–a woman’s voice that was supposed to sound human but there was actually nothing human about it. The voice was also speaking English, but what it was saying made absolutely no sense whatsoever and the effect of it was fiendishly unnerving.

There has to be a rational explanation for this, I told myself again as I glanced over at the others and forced myself to stand my ground. Of course, in the end there was a completely rational explanation for all of it. But little did I know how far I would have to go to try and find it or how many answers would still be left unsolved once I did.

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