IT HAPPENS SO QUICKLY: a car shoots out from the curb, hits Fiona’s father and then speeds away. Is it an accident? Or is it a warning to Fiona and her Canadian cousin, Gavin, to turn back? Gavin is in Scotland to hike across the moors, and Fiona’s dad isn’t about to let a broken leg stop the kids’ fun. Fiona and Gavin will go on without him.

A broken leg turns out to be the least of their troubles as the cousins unwittingly stumble onto a monstrous conspiracy to kidnap a girl?and get caught by the conspirators. Managing to escape, Gavin and Fiona suddenly find themselves in the middle of a plot to assassinate a royal family member. With his trademark high energy style and heart-stopping pacing, Robert Sutherland has written another super adventure-thriller sure to grab his many middle-grade fans.

Born in Priceville, Ontario, in 1925, Robert Sutherland lived briefly in Cape Breton and then Scotland before returning to Canada where he attended Flesherton High School. During World War II, he joined the Royal Canadian Navy and served from 1943 to 1946 as an anti-aircraft gunner on a Loch Class frigate (HMCS Loch Morlich). When his ship was in dry dock in London for repairs, he experienced doodlebug bombing. While in the navy he met Charlotte Cameron of Glasgow, and they married in Toronto in 1948. They have three children, seven grandchildren and one great grandson. Robert’s first success with fiction was a full length novel in the Toronto Star Weekly in 1960. He used the proceeds to set up a hobby of selling Scottish regalia and gifts from his home, a hobby he still pursues. On two of his many rejection slips for other novels, the editor had written “Suggest you try writing for teens.” When he returned to writing in the 1980s he decided to follow this advice. He rewrote the story that had been published in the Star, cutting down on the descriptions and making his protagonist a teen who accidentally stumbled into espionage. Mystery at Black Rock Island, published by Scholastic, was an immediate success, and the first of five successful books about teenagers David and Sandy. He has now had fourteen novels published, which have received numerous nominations and prizes. His novels have been translated into French, Norwegian, Swedish, German and Korean. Robert now lives in Westport, Ontario.

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