Victor Appleton’s The Drone Pursuit is the first Tom Swift Inventors’ Academy book, a gadget-packed school mystery for 9 year olds about a stolen drone and a caretaker who might be a wanted hacker.<\/p>\n
Tom and Noah have spent the whole weekend building a drone with tiny microphones and a camera at each end. With virtual reality visors on, it feels like you’re sitting inside it. (Noah gets so queasy he has to run for the toilets.)<\/p>\n
At Tom’s school this is all fairly normal. His dad’s company paid for the place, and drones and little robots zip about the corridors. So nobody blinks when the boys escape a chase by sticking their drone to a ceiling tile.<\/p>\n
Then it disappears. The drone’s own camera shows Tom where it’s gone, onto the cleaning cart of Mr Conway the caretaker and down into a locked basement.<\/p>\n
That same morning a supply teacher puts on a film about famous hackers. One of them was never caught, and Tom’s friend Sam thinks he looks a lot like Mr Conway. Tom isn’t sure. Then every computer in the school crashes at once, and a text from an unknown number tells him to back off.<\/p>\n
What makes it fun is the gang. Noah is the coder. Sam is the conspiracy theorist who won a scholarship for a water invention. Amy has a photographic memory and a clock in her head that’s never wrong. They tease each other like real friends (Noah is renamed Hurl Boy within minutes).<\/p>\n
Tom is a great narrator for a child who loves gadgets. He explains how everything works, from the sound filters to the pins that let the drone park in the ceiling. He’s also honest that real-life plans are not his strong point.<\/p>\n
His mum died when he was little, which is mentioned briefly as background. His dad still makes time for dinner with him every night.<\/p>\n
If you’ve got a reader who takes things apart to see how they work, this is a very easy one to love.<\/p>\n
If they want more of the Formidable Foursome, The Sonic Breach is next. This time Tom’s class is building fighting robots for a tournament, with axe-wielding machines (plastic heads for practice!) and plenty of trash talk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Victor Appleton’s The Drone Pursuit is the first Tom Swift Inventors’ Academy book, a gadget-packed school mystery for 9 year olds about a stolen drone and a caretaker who might be a wanted hacker. Tom and Noah have spent the whole weekend building a drone with tiny microphones and a camera at each end. With […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":11823,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"lr_next_read_post_id":9420,"lr_next_read_anchor":"The Sonic Breach","lr_seo_hook":"Four young inventors, a lost drone and a caretaker with a locked basement.","lr_series_id":105,"lr_series_name":"Tom Swift Inventors' Academy","lr_series_position":1,"lr_series_label":""},"book_tag":[1045],"age_group":[24],"book_type":[1044],"book_author":[1010],"class_list":["post-9004","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-victor-appleton"],"yoast_title":"Tom Swift Inventors’ Academy 1 – The Drone Pursuit by Victor Appleton | Little Reads","yoast_metadesc":"Four young inventors, a lost drone and a caretaker with a locked basement. For ages 9+. 3,000+ books in the Little Reads app. 7-day free trial.","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n