Teodora’s Book Reviews: “Special Agents – Deep End” by Sam Hutton (HarperCollins Children’s Books, 2010)

If you strongly believe that clickbait videos are the most irritating deceptions, you may want to consider books with misinterpreting descriptions. A book which announces a new cutting-edge, fast-paced crime series with strong characters, believable dialogue, authentic locations and compelling plots can only raise your expectations. Allow me to lower them a bit by putting forward a more realistic presentation: “a book which most likely announces a new cutting-ties, really fast-paced crime series with barely developed characters, snappy dialogue, authentic locations and confusing plots”.

I would be lying if I said that I didn’t enjoy the beginning. Or rather the way it unfolded. The story is based around a girl, Maddie, who has her family gunned down as a revenge attack by a convict. Her mom is killed and her father’s life is confined to a wheelchair. To make matters worse, even the girl’s hope of becoming a professional ballet dancer is out of the question. Although I already knew what was going to happen from the back cover description, it still proved to be difficult to read about Maddie’s excitement for the future:

“Maddie found it hard to take life completely seriously, especially when everything was such fun. (...) All things considered, Maddie thought as she jumped up into Mrs Petrie’s Range Rover, life couldn’t get much better.” (page 15)

“Maddie couldn’t stop smiling. She knew that she was on the brink of a wonderful future. All she had to do was reach out and close her fingers around it and the world would be hers.” (page 16)

The author somehow manages to capture the tight relationship between the girl and her parents within the first few pages. Despite not having loads of information about the family itself, I couldn’t help but get stuck into this unusual tendency of mine where I hopelessly long for a fortunate turn of events (even though the heartbreaking destinies were already established, written and printed). I often find myself expecting till the last moment that my mind will change a certain scene with some unspeakable powers. I went through the same process while reading about Maddie using all of her senses when trapped in a numb body:

“There was no pain, although she understood in a vague way that she had been injured. She felt herself drifting. She wondered what had happened to her parents. She hoped they were all right.
She wished she could feel her legs.
She closed her eyes.
She could hear strangers bustling around her.
The next sound she heard was the wail of a siren getting gradually nearer.
Good, she thought.
Now everything would be OK.” (page 18)

Seeing the last sentence followed by the daunting headline Top London Police Officer and Family in Shooting Outrage made me feel entirely nauseous. But then I reassured myself that the story would turn out to be a gripping page-turner... only to find out that the book is nothing more than a collection of illogical events.

After a few months of recovery, Maddie seeks her own revenge. Her father’s decision to let her join the police force at short notice comes off as surprise. From that point on, everything just goes downhill regarding the plot development. Maddie teams up with two other employed teenagers, Danny and Alex. If you ask me, it is quite inexplicable why two trainee police agents and a recently injured girl are left all alone in charge of keeping an eye on incoming flights for some petty, yet dangerous drug smugglers. The youngsters’ eagerness pushes them to set out to track and trap the group of smugglers led by the same convicted felon who killed Maddie’s mother.

As much as I appreciate a special task force and the idea of fighting crime on the streets of London, I couldn’t bring myself to enjoy the story. It is a real shame to avoid adding depth to the series just to jump straight into the action, especially given the fact that the beginning was promising potential close-ups into the characters’ lives and intentions. Surely, we should not neglect that the young adult market seeks out to offer readable stories for teenagers who are in the same hurry as our set of characters. Therefore, can you be convinced to keep on reading the Special Agents series after experiencing Deep End? It depends.