Somewhere on Reddit, a thread about the best Alex Rider books has been arguing with itself for six years. Fans of this series do not hold their opinions loosely.
They’re an excellent way to get your child hooked by the vivid story-telling, suspense and just good fun to read!
Yes, Alex does escape death 10 times in one book but that’s why kids (and adults love them). It’s wall-to-wall action.
From what i’ve seen in the classroom and also in my own opinion. This is where I’d rank the books.
Please note: it’s JUST my opinion. Don’t come for me, okay?
BUT, Scorpia is the best one. Stormbreaker is the one they should read first. And Eagle Strike is the one the fans rave about, with good reason.
We stock the first eight missions, complete. All of Anthony Horowitz sits with our action books for 10 year olds, and this series is why.
Which Alex Rider book should they read first?
Stormbreaker, of course.
The series is one long story about what being a spy costs a teenager. The reluctance, the school cover story, the sense that the adults are using him. All of it is set up in the first mission, and the later books lean on it constantly.
Can they jump straight to Scorpia because someone at school said it’s the best? I’d talk them out of it. Scorpia is the best precisely because of everything that’s happened by then, and it spoils three earlier books within its first few chapters.
There’s another reason to start at the beginning. These books are cronological. Snakehead brings back an old enemy, Scorpia trades on everything Alex has learnt about his past, and a reader who skips ahead gets the plot without the weight of it.
(Wondering whether they’re ready for Alex Rider at all? Our what age are Alex Rider books for guide covers it mission by mission.)
The best Alex Rider books, ranked
My order, and I’ll happily be argued with. The plots below stay light on detail, because half the joy of this series is the suspense.
For what it’s worth, the fan rankings and mine mostly agree at the top. Where we part ways is further down, and I’ve said why for each…
1. Scorpia
Scorpia
The one the fans keep voting top, and I’m with them.
Alex travels to Venice to dig out the truth about his past. The trouble is that the truth belongs to a criminal organisation called Scorpia, and it leaves him facing a choice. Work for MI6 once more, or betray everything he believes in.
This is the mission where the series really grows up. The gadgets are still there, but the stakes are more personal, and the last chapter deals Alex a blow the rest of the series never quite shakes off. For the reader who’s a few missions in and ready to have their loyalties tested.
It’s also the book the whole argument is about. When the internet votes on the best Alex Rider book, this is the one that keeps winning.
2. Eagle Strike
Eagle Strike
The fan favourite.
Alex is in the South of France, hoping to cut his ties with MI6 for good. Then a sudden attack on the family he’s staying with drags him back into a world of violence, and he uncovers a plan called Eagle Strike (worse than anything he could have imagined).
It feels like a film, and for once Alex is working alone, without MI6 behind him. This is probably one that your child will stay up late with (sorry). Fans on the forums rank it just behind Scorpia, and a fair few put it first.
3. Stormbreaker
Stormbreaker
Not the best but the necessary starting point.
They said his uncle Ian died in a car accident. The bullet holes in the windscreen say otherwise. Then Alex learns his uncle was really a spy for Britain’s top secret intelligence agency, and now he’s been recruited to find his uncle’s killers.
Everything the series becomes starts here. It’s also the one book on this page you can hand over with no set-up at all, which is exactly what a first mission should be.
4. Snakehead
Snakehead
The darkest of the eight.
Alex splashes down off the coast of Australia and is soon working undercover for ASIS (the Australian secret service), infiltrating the criminal underworld of South East Asia. The ruthless world of the Snakehead is waiting, and so is an old enemy. Caught between two secret services, Alex has no one to trust.
One for a reader who’s comfortable with the series at its most grown-up.
5. Ark Angel
Ark Angel
The most outlandish mission.
A chance encounter with the son of multi-billionaire Nikolei Drevin pulls Alex into the middle of an international crime hunt. At the centre of it sits Ark Angel, a revolutionary space hotel with catastrophic potential.
If your child loves the gadgets more than the spy-craft, this will be their number one. And yes, it ends roughly where you’d guess a space-hotel book might.
And the rest of the missions
None of the other three misses by much.
Point Blanc is the second mission. MI6 sends Alex to infiltrate the exclusive Point Blanc Academy, which hides a deadly secret and an UNBELIEVABLE twist.
Skeleton Key teams Alex up with the CIA on a remote Caribbean island, where a general named Sarov is hatching explosive plans to re-write history. The biggest of the early missions.
Crocodile Tears starts with a simple card game against a man called Desmond McCain and turns into a duel to the death, one that could take an entire country with it. It only just missed my top five, and plenty of fans would put it in theirs.
If they’ve torn through the lot and want more Horowitz without more MI6, The Falcon’s Malteser and Public Enemy Number Two are his Diamond Brothers books. Detective comedy rather than spy thriller.
And once the Horowitz shelf is done and dusted, our books like Alex Rider list takes over. For a younger sibling who wants in on the family spy business, children’s spy books has every age covered.
Just so you know…
Little Reads stocks all eight Alex Rider missions, every book on this page included, inside a hand-picked library of 3,000+ books for children aged 5 to 11. A free account gives you 100+ free books. Full access is £7.99 a month after a 7-day free trial, and you can cancel anytime.
It’s a library, not a classroom, so it isn’t the app for phonics or learning to read. It’s for the child who’s already three missions deep and negotiating for a torch at bedtime.