So I finally read it for our book club meeting yesterday. And she was right – it’s great! It’s not my usual fare – thriller/adventure – but it was quite entertaining. Spy School is about a 12 year-old boy named Ben who is chosen to leave his typical public school to attend spy school run by the C.I.A. outside of D.C. Spy school is exactly what it sounds like – training grounds for kids who have shown aptitude to become a spy, with classes like self-defense and cryptography. At first, Ben is thrilled, as this is his dream come true. But once he gets to the school, he realizes that may not be cut out for it… and that he might be there under false pretenses.
As the plot unfolds, Ben finds himself being chased by an assassin, bullied by a dumb upperclassman, collaborating with the coolest girl in the school, and let down by the administrators who are supposed to protect him. There is a lot of action, as Ben is constantly on the run from danger. It’s a relatively lighthearted book, despite the high stakes of the story, with a lot of humor thrown in. Ben is a typical 12 year-old: nerdy and girl-crazy, quick to question authority, but underneath it all excited and earnest about what he’s doing.
Some reviewers complained about bad language – “damn” and “ass” – but that it didn’t bother me, and it didn’t come up during our discussion yesterday.
I am impressed by how much my daughter enjoyed this book and its sequels. She was totally involved with the story and loved trying to figure out who was after Ben and why. Some of the girls in the book club didn’t like reading a book with a male protagonist, while others didn’t mind, and in fact enjoyed getting a boy’s perspective.
Don’t be bothered by the fact that Spy School is totally implausible. (Why would these kids be in spy school in 8th grade? And how could so many high-ranking intelligence officers converge at this school and be unable to figure out who is trying to infiltrate it?) Gibbs has created a really fun world for middle-grade readers to experience without the weightiness or complexity of the typical spy or adventure novel.