James Patterson and Chris Grabenstein’s Peril at the Top of the World is a globe-trotting adventure for 9 year olds about a family of treasure hunters who get blamed for a museum robbery themselves.<\/p>\n
The Kidds find stolen treasure for a living and hand it back to its owners. Bick tells the story. His twin Beck is the artist, big sister Storm has a photographic memory and seventeen-year-old Tommy goes weak at the knees whenever a girl walks past.<\/p>\n
It opens in Florence in the middle of the night, with the family squashed into a van waiting for smugglers. Bick and Beck are under strict orders to sit still and observe (you can guess how long that lasts).<\/p>\n
The smugglers work for a secret gang of art thieves who call themselves the Enlightened Ones, and the gang likes playing games. Soon a stern museum guard in Russia hands the family an envelope sealed with wax. Inside is a clue.<\/p>\n
The very next morning four masterpieces vanish from the Hermitage, the museum next door to their hotel, a Rembrandt among them.<\/p>\n
Then a thirteen-year-old billionaire sweeps in wearing a fur coat and leading two wolfhounds. He weeps into a whole string of silk hankies and announces that the Kidds did it.<\/p>\n
So they’re carted off to jail with their know-it-all tour guide (who carries on giving the tour). From there the clues point north, towards the Arctic.<\/p>\n
Reading it is like being told a story by a boy who can’t go two minutes without a joke. Storm gives history lectures mid car chase. The twins have blazing rows that burn out in a minute because neither can remember what started them.<\/p>\n
Your reader will pick up a surprising amount on the way, too (the lost Amber Room, the Faberg\u00e9 eggs, who the Medicis were). The chapters are very short and most of them stop on an uh-oh.<\/p>\n
It’s worth knowing there are stun guns and a pistol early on. Soldiers tie Bick’s wrists and the tour guide lists Russia’s grimmest prisons. It’s all played for laughs, but a child who takes threats to heart might not find it funny.<\/p>\n
This is the fourth Treasure Hunters book, and Bick gives away how the earlier adventures turned out. If your reader hasn’t met the Kidds yet, start with the first one.<\/p>\n
If the clue-by-clue chase is what they love, The Maze of Bones kicks off another. Amy and Dan Cahill are offered a million dollars each or a single clue, and some of the relatives they’re up against are very rich and very nasty.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
James Patterson and Chris Grabenstein’s Peril at the Top of the World is a globe-trotting adventure for 9 year olds about a family of treasure hunters who get blamed for a museum robbery themselves. The Kidds find stolen treasure for a living and hand it back to its owners. Bick tells the story. His twin […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14195,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"lr_next_read_post_id":8051,"lr_next_read_anchor":"The Maze of Bones","lr_seo_hook":"A stolen Rembrandt, a weepy teen billionaire and a family thrown in jail.","lr_series_id":371,"lr_series_name":"Treasure Hunters","lr_series_position":4,"lr_series_label":"","lr_author_order":"427,190"},"book_tag":[1045],"age_group":[24],"book_type":[1044],"book_author":[190,427],"class_list":["post-14196","our-books","type-our-books","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","book_tag-adventure-books","age_group-books-for-9-year-olds","book_type-paid","book_author-chris-grabenstein","book_author-james-patterson"],"yoast_title":"Treasure Hunters – Peril at the Top of the World by James Patterson & Chris Grabenstein | Little Reads","yoast_metadesc":"A stolen Rembrandt, a weepy teen billionaire and a family thrown in jail. For ages 9+. 3,000+ books in the Little Reads app. 7-day free trial.","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n