Wicked's Way

Gr 4–6—Pirate adventure stories are hardly a new excursion, but this novel of scoundrels, secrets, and discovering the truth will pull readers in from the first page. Will lives a quiet life with his mother, hidden away on an island far away from anyone else. Will himself is a secret. He's been kept from wandering eyes to save him from the pirates who crash ashore every year to kidnap young boys. Alone, except for his mother, he spends his days learning funambulism from her, the fine art of tightrope walking and juggling, which she used to do in her days in the circus. When his mother mysteriously disappears, Will is thrust into the world of the pirates from whom she worked so hard to shield him. This title will attract plenty of readers; it has action, friendship, humor, redemption, and (obviously) some very rowdy pirates, some of whom Will finds favorable by the end of his adventure.