befus's Full Review: Trenton Lee Stewart - The Mysterious Benedict Soci...
Reynie Muldoon, George "Sticky" Washington, Kate Weatherall and Constance Contraire are not your average children. In fact, unbeknownst to most people, they recently played key roles in defeating an arch-criminal with cruel designs to take over and tyrannize the world.
Small wonder that, a year later, the kids are feeling a trifle bored. Not that they're not thankful that the days of danger are over, but normal life just doesn't seem quite as exciting as it used to. True, each of their lives has changed in significant ways as a result of their adventure together. Reynie has finally been adopted by his dear friend Miss Perumal; Sticky has been reunited with his parents; Kate and her long-lost father have set up life again on their farm; and Constance now lives with Mr. Benedict, the kindhearted and brilliant man who brought them all together in the first place. Life is better, calmer, more secure than it ever was before. But still...there's a wistful little longing buried deep inside each kid for another exciting adventure. Plus they just plain miss each other.
Mr. Benedict, their mentor, certainly understands that. That's why he decides to devise a surprise for the children, one that will reunite them and provide them a chance to use some of the talents they began to develop as secret agents in their first adventure. With the permission of their various parents and guardians, he and his assistants Rhonda and "Number Two" plan an adventure for the children. It's basically a scavenger hunt, with the clues starting at Mr. Benedict's headquarters but ultimately taking the kids on a long journey. Since Mr. Benedict knows the talents of these particular four children quite well, he plans to set up mysteries that will challenge them and allow them to exercise their gifts.
Well, that's the original plan. But you know what they say about the best laid plans! Reunited at Mr. Benedict's, the children barely have time to reacquaint themselves with each other before they discover that the surprise planned for them is not going come off. It can't, because Mr. Benedict and Number Two have both been kidnapped by their old nemesis, the arch-villain Letdroptha Curtain.
That's the set-up for The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey, the recently published sequel to Trenton Lee Stewart's original (and successful) mid-grade novel The Mysterious Benedict Society. It's not giving anything away to say that the kids do indeed end up going on another adventure, but it's not quite the safe, well-planned one that their teachers and mentors hoped they would take. Instead, they find themselves facing many of the same dangers they faced in their first outing but at even higher personal risk. Their admiration and respect for Mr. Benedict compels them to try to find him, even though it means going out on their own. Fortunately, they do get some much-needed help along the way, especially when secret agent Milligan (his memory now fully recovered) tracks them down.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say something I hardly ever say: I liked the sequel better than the original. And that's saying something because I really enjoyed the initial book. Stewart's odd but creative fictional world, well-planned plot, and interesting young characters served him (and us) quite well in the first book. But with the introductions out of the way, this time around he's able to move more quickly into the adventure -- and it's shaped more like a quest than a mission. Whereas the kids had to pretty much stay put in the last book (in their undercover roles in Curtain's sinister school) this time they range over many more locales, even taking an ocean voyage. The final showdown takes place on an island that feels fraught with danger. The stakes also feel higher and deeper. Perhaps it's strange to say that, since last time around Curtain's plan put the whole world in jeopardy. This time around, his ultimate plan would still endanger the planet, but his immediate dastardly deeds imperil the lives of two specific characters the children (and by extension, we readers) have come to care about: Mr. Benedict and Number Two. That actually ramps up the danger and potential loss quite a bit.
In fact, there are some scary moments in this book, especially those involving the "Ten Men" employed by Curtain. They're called that, incidentally, because they have at least ten ways they can seriously hurt people, but it's a tribute to Stewart's playful way with language that "Ten Men" automatically makes us think of characters without hearts. These sinister agents look like ordinary dark suited businessmen but they're dangerous and the kids get into some pretty difficult situations when facing them. The scary scenes, added to the kids' overt struggle over whether or not to obey Milligan's orders (not to mention the fact that they all ran out without telling their parents where they were going in the first place) puts this book firmly in the 12 and up category in my mind (and should raise some interesting discussion in families).
But more than the exciting plot, what makes me give this book a fifth star is its stellar character development. Given how much I enjoyed the first book, I expected this one to have more of the same exciting adventure. What I didn't necessarily expect was the subtle ways in which Stewart allowed his young characters to grow and change from that book to this one, especially showing how their last adventure shaped them.
Sticky still struggles with fear, but his more pressing difficulty is a new tendency toward vanity and showing off, a trait that actually gets the kids into some trouble. Kate, definitely the book's action hero (along with the older Milligan) has perhaps changed the least in her basic personality, but she's more vulnerable now that she's learned she's not a lone ranger and that sometimes one's decisions have to be based on love and not just efficiency. A surprising thing that readers learned about Constance at the end of the first book opened up new possibilities and insights into her intriguing character, but even Constance changes in ways I didn't expect in this book, especially as she explores unusual gifts of intuition and pattern recognition. Meanwhile, Reynie is still the heart and soul of the novel and we see most things through his eyes. Stewart has wisely given Reynie the deepest and most understandable human dilemma of all, given their adventures in the last book: a tendency to focus on the bad he sees in people, with a corollary of not knowing entirely who to trust.
How all those personality traits get woven into a fun and exciting spy story makes The Mysterious Benedict Society And The Perilous Journey a compelling read. Kids and young adults will love it, and adults along for the ride may also have a difficult time putting this one down. Here's hoping for a third installment in the adventures of a fantastic foursome!
~befus, 2009
The Mysterious Benedict SocietyAnd the Perilous Journey by Trenton Lee Stewart Little, Brown and Company, 2008 ISBN 9780316057806
Puzzles, games, and an irresistible sense of adventure highlight this sequel to The Mysterious Benedict Society, in which the fabulous foursome is bac...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
General Juvenile / Children's Fiction - The fabulous foursome readers embraced as The Mysterious Benedict Society is back with a new mission, signific...More at Barnes and Noble
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