''Ark Angel'' is the sixth book in the ''Alex Rider'' series written by British author

Anthony Horowitz Anthony John Horowitz, (born 5 April 1955) is an English novelist and screenwriter specialising in mystery and suspense. His works for children and young adult readers include ''The Diamond Brothers'' series, the ''Alex Rider'' series, and ''T ...

. The novel is a

spy thriller Spy fiction is a genre of literature involving espionage as an important context or plot device. It emerged in the early twentieth century, inspired by rivalries and intrigues between the major powers, and the establishment of modern intelligen ...

which follows the attempt by the title character, Alex Rider, to foil the plot of a Russian billionaire. The book was released in the United Kingdom on 1 April 2005 and in the United States on 20 April 2006. Initial reviews of the book were positive.

Plot

Maximilian Webber, a former

SAS SAS or Sas may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * ''SAS'' (novel series), a French book series by Gérard de Villiers * ''Shimmer and Shine'', an American animated children's television series * Southern All Stars, a Japanese rock ba ...

, gives a speech denouncing an extreme eco-terrorist organisation known as Force Three. After the speech, he is contacted by an unknown man who declares him an enemy of Force Three. The phone explodes, killing him. Meanwhile, Alex Rider is recuperating in a hospital after being shot at the end of his previous mission. He meets Paul Drevin, the son of a

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

n billionaire Nikolei Drevin. One night, four men break into the hospital and attempt to kidnap Paul, but Alex manages to overpower them. However, he is captured by Kaspar, the leader, and imprisoned in an abandoned building where the men reveal themselves as members of Force Three. The men set fire to the building after realising that Alex deliberately foiled their plan. Alex escapes from the fire by

tightrope walking Tightrope walking, also called funambulism, is the skill of walking along a thin wire or rope. It has a long tradition in various countries and is commonly associated with the circus. Other skills similar to tightrope walking include slack rope ...

to an adjacent building, and returns to the hospital, where he is debriefed by John Crawley, MI6 Chief of Staff, and later discharged. Back home, Nikolei Drevin invites Alex to stay with him for two weeks as thanks for preventing his son's kidnapping. As Alex's doctor has recommended that he take a holiday, he accepts. Alex meets Drevin and his

jobsworth A jobsworth is a person who uses the (typically small) authority of their job in a deliberately uncooperative way, or who seemingly delights in acting in an obstructive or unhelpful manner. It characterizes one who upholds petty rules even at the ...

assistant, Tamara Knight, at a hotel where Drevin is holding a press conference about his space project, Ark Angel; it is set to be the first-ever space hotel. Alex is treated well by Drevin, but starts suspecting him after realizing that Paul had been given no protection before the Force Three attack, despite claims of always being "a target". Stumbling into Drevin's private study, Alex discovers that Drevin owns the building where Alex was interrogated and nearly killed by Force Three. The following day, Alex participates in a race on Drevin’s private

go-kart A go-kart, also written as go-cart (often referred to as simply a kart), is a type of sports car, close wheeled car, open-wheel car or quadracycle. Go-karts come in all shapes and forms, from non-motorised models to high-performance Kart rac ...

track; Alex beats Drevin when the man attempts to cheat, revealing his hatred of losing. Later, Alex watches a football match at

Stamford Bridge Stamford Bridge may refer to: * Stamford Bridge, East Riding of Yorkshire, a village in England ** Battle of Stamford Bridge, 25 September 1066 * Stamford Bridge (bridge), a bridge in the village of Stamford Bridge * Stamford Bridge (stadium), in L ...

with the home team,

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

, up against a team owned by Drevin, Stratford East, which loses. Alex encounters Force Three members giving a medal to the team captain who missed the final penalty, and is briefly taken by one of the Force Three men, but manages to get away. Alex tells Tamara Knight about Force Three, but the footballer is killed when the medal, made of

caesium Caesium (IUPAC spelling) (or cesium in American English) is a chemical element with the symbol Cs and atomic number 55. It is a soft, silvery-golden alkali metal with a melting point of , which makes it one of only five elemental metals that a ...

, catches fire in the shower. Drevin, Tamara, Alex and Paul fly to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, but Alex is apprehended at the airport by an immigration official who claims that his passport is expired. This turns out to be a ruse by the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...

to bring Alex to Joe Byrne, the chief of the CIA. Byrne reveals that the CIA have investigated Drevin's wealth and found it to be attained through underworld contacts; they plan to arrest him for

money laundering Money laundering is the process of concealing the origin of money, obtained from illicit activities such as drug trafficking, corruption, embezzlement or gambling, by converting it into a legitimate source. It is a crime in many jurisdictions ...

. Worried that Drevin will slip away, Byrne assigns Alex to report to him if he sees anything amiss at Flamingo Bay, Drevin's private island, from where Ark Angel

rockets A rocket (from it, rocchetto, , bobbin/spool) is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using the surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed. Rocket engines work entirely fr ...

are launched. Smithers, the gadget master at MI6, arrives and provides Alex with gadgets, including

mosquito repellent An insect repellent (also commonly called "bug spray") is a substance applied to skin, clothing, or other surfaces to discourage insects (and arthropods in general) from landing or climbing on that surface. Insect repellents help prevent and cont ...

that attracts all manner of insects, an

asthma inhaler A metered-dose inhaler (MDI) is a device that delivers a specific amount of medication to the lungs, in the form of a short burst of aerosolized medicine that is usually self-administered by the patient via inhalation. It is the most commonly used ...

that can be used as a

grenade A grenade is an explosive weapon typically thrown by hand (also called hand grenade), but can also refer to a shell (explosive projectile) shot from the muzzle of a rifle (as a rifle grenade) or a grenade launcher. A modern hand grenade genera ...

or a

knockout gas The term incapacitating agent is defined by the United States Department of Defense as: :"An agent that produces temporary physiological or mental effects, or both, which will render individuals incapable of concerted effort in the performance of ...

dispenser, and an

iPod The iPod is a discontinued series of portable media players and multi-purpose mobile devices designed and marketed by Apple Inc. The first version was released on October 23, 2001, about months after the Macintosh version of iTunes ...

that allows him to listen to phone calls. On Flamingo Bay, Alex intercepts a phone call from Drevin, who will be meeting someone the following night. Later, however, Drevin finds out about Alex's identity from the security chief, Magnus Payne, and decides to have him killed by sending him to dive into a shipwreck, in which he is locked in. Right when Alex is about to run out of air, Tamara appears and saves him, revealing that she has been Joe Byrne's inside man all along. The two go undercover to investigate Drevin's meeting, and see him meeting with Force Three, but are caught when Tamara accidentally sets off an alarm. Alex is brought to Drevin, who reveals his intention to destroy Ark Angel with a bomb and send its wreckage crashing down on

the Pentagon The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense. It was constructed on an accelerated schedule during World War II. As a symbol of the U.S. military, the phrase ''The Pentagon'' is often used as a metony ...

in Washington D.C. As the project has gone over budget and Drevin stands to lose money if he continues to finance it, he plans to recoup his losses with a large insurance payout from the station's destruction, while at the same time destroying the CIA's evidence of his criminal activities. Force Three are revealed to be hired hands, formed to act as scapegoats for Ark Angel's destruction. Payne then kills all members of Force Three, and reveals himself to be Kaspar, the leader of Force Three, with a

tattoo A tattoo is a form of body modification made by inserting tattoo ink, dyes, and/or pigments, either indelible or temporary, into the dermis layer of the skin to form a design. Tattoo artists create these designs using several Process of tatt ...

of a globe on his head. Alex and Tamara are imprisoned, but Alex escapes and meets the CIA team stationed in

Barbados Barbados is an island country in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the Caribbean region of the Americas, and the most easterly of the Caribbean Islands. It occupies an area of and has a population of about 287,000 (2019 estimate). ...

, but the

Atlas rocket Atlas is a family of US missiles and space launch vehicles that originated with the SM-65 Atlas. The Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program was initiated in the late 1950s under the Convair Division of General Dynamics. Atlas was ...

with the bomb launches off to Ark Angel. The CIA team storm Flamingo Island and Drevin attempts to shoot Alex in the chaos, but Paul gets hit instead. Drevin leaves Paul and tries to escape, but his plane crashes, killing him instantly. As there is no way to stop the bomb on the ground, Alex is to travel up to Ark Angel in a second Soyuz-Frigat rocket to deal with it manually. He encounters Kaspar aboard Ark Angel but manages to overpower him using the effects of zero-gravity and the sun, and Kaspar is stabbed to death by his own knife. Alex then moves the bomb away so that the wreckage from the detonation will simply break up and disintegrate during atmospheric reentry. Ark Angel explodes and Alex falls back to Earth, landing a hundred miles off the coast of

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Characters

Alex Rider Paul Drevin

Reception

Philip Ardagh at ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' gave ''Ark Angel'' a positive review, stating "It's perfectly pitched at its readership. Ark Angel reads the way a children's thriller should read" and "This is a welcome new addition o the series"

References

External links

Official website of the Alex Rider series''Ark Angel'' at Walker Books Anthony Horowitz Official Website
{{Authority control 2005 British novels Alex Rider novels Novels set in Antarctica Eco-terrorism in fiction 2005 children's books Walker Books books