This is the second part to the excerpt posts (scroll down to see part one) and today it's from book two in the Super Spies series by Lisa Orchard, The Super Spies and The High School Bomber! Again, this post will include the synopsis of the book, the excerpt and then more about the author. So let's get to it!
This book opens in a small town in Michigan where Sarah and her sister Lacey are now living with their Aunt and Uncle. Teetering from the fact her parents have disappeared, Sarah starts the school year with her new friend Jackie Jenkins. When Sarah learns the school has been bombed, she’s filled with dread. Uncle Walt is a teacher, and he was in the school when the bomb exploded. Taking matters into her own hands, Sarah decides to search for him. The rest of the Super Spies are right behind her. When a fireman chases them away from the school, Sarah becomes suspicious. His fire retardant coat doesn’t fit and his hat’s too big. She decides to investigate. Suddenly, the FBI arrives on the scene. Now Sarah realizes this bombing could have even bigger implications. Searching for the bombers, Sarah is introduced to the world of terrorism. She fears that the bombing and her parents’ disappearance are connected and terrorists are involved. Trying to keep her family together, Sarah and the Super Spies take it upon themselves to find the motive behind the bombing and the bombers themselves. Working with the FBI, the Super Spies race to catch the bombers before they set off another bomb. Will they succeed? Find out by reading the next book in the Super Spies series. “The Super Spies and the High School Bomber.”
A
whoosh of roiling hot air lifted Sarah Cole and flung her against the kitchen wall like a fumbled football.
At the same time, the windows burst into millions of pieces, showering
everything with tiny shards of glass. Sarah crumpled to the floor, still
clutching the phone. She lay there stunned, unable to inhale or exhale.
“Sarah! Sarah!” her younger sister, Lacey,
screamed from the bathroom, where she’d been drying her hair.
The ringing in her ears was so intense,
Sarah could barely hear her. Groaning, she opened her eyes and saw only red
through her right one. Dread rippled through her body.
“Sarah! Sarah!” Lacey cried again.
Sarah dropped the phone, and put her hand up
to her eye. She fingered the area gently before pulling her hand away. Blood.
“Lacey,” she croaked, unable to manage more than that.
“Sarah! Where are you?”
“The kitchen,” Sarah said, finally able to
breathe. She blinked her eyes twice and her vision cleared. Relief flooded her body
and she wilted against the floor.
“Holy Moley!” Lacey shrieked.
Sarah jumped at the sound of her voice. She
didn’t realize Lacey had come up the stairs and into the kitchen. The ringing
in her ears was almost gone.
“You’re bleeding!”
“No kidding,” Sarah said, covering her right
eye with her hand and glaring at Lacey with her uncovered one. She brushed her
shoulder length blonde hair away from her face and gasped at the blood running down her arm.
“We’ve got to get you to the hospital!”
Lacey screamed in a voice edged with hysteria.
“Stop freaking out!” Sarah gave Lacey the
old one-eyed glare again.
“Sarah, there’s blood everywhere,” her
sister whimpered as she wrung her hands. She gazed around her. “What happened?
Did our furnace blow up or something?”
“I don’t think so.” Sarah shook her head,
dust particles and slivers of glass cascaded to the floor. She furrowed her
brow and absentmindedly brushed off her clothes. “I think something exploded outside. Help me up.”
Lacey held out her hand to Sarah and pulled
her into a sitting position.
Blinking, Sarah gazed around the kitchen. On
most days it was a sunny room with pineapple wallpaper and pine cabinets. It was
the most popular room in the house—everyone congregated there during the holidays. Sarah blinked again. Dust floated through the
air and glass littered the yellow linoleum floor. She groaned and turned her attention
to her arm. As she examined the blood running down it, another wave of panic flooded
through her body. Sarah’s legs wobbled when she stood and she stumbled as she
reached for a kitchen towel that lay on the counter. She used the soft cloth to blot her eye. When she pulled
the towel away, she was shocked to see the amount of blood that had soaked into
it. Sarah gulped, trying to swallow her fear as beads of sweat broke out on her
forehead.
With unsteady feet, Sarah stumbled into the
hall where a mirror hung.
She was afraid to look. Taking some deep
breaths, she stared into the cracked mirror and noticed a cut in her eyebrow.
The amount of blood that seeped from the cut was enormous compared to its small
size.
Lacey walked past Sarah on her way to the
den. The crunch of glass under her sister’s feet caught Sarah’s attention, and
she sighed. Thank goodness we had our shoes on. A wave of relief washed over
her body and she exhaled another deep sigh. The girls had been getting ready
for school when the windows exploded and covered everything with glass.
“Sarah, come here! You’ve got to see this!”
Lacey yelled.
Sarah whirled around and spotted her sister
walking from the den—her eyes were round and full of shock.
“I think all the windows have been smashed.
Come and look.”
Holding the towel against her cut, Sarah
followed her into the den. “Holy crap!”
She gazed into the room. Shards of glass
covered the furniture and the floor. The sun streamed through the window, shining
on the jagged bits embedded in the carpet. It appeared as if tiny diamonds were buried within the fibers.
“What in the world happened?”
Sarah shook her head. “I have no idea.”
The shrill ring of the phone made Sarah
jump. She dashed back to the kitchen and found the phone where she had dropped
it earlier.
“Hello?”
“Sarah?”
“Jackie?”
“Yeah, it’s me.” Jackie’s voice eased some
of the tension in Sarah’s body. Jackie Jenkins was her best friend. They had
met when Sarah and her sister moved in with their aunt and uncle three months
earlier.
Sarah glanced down at her legs and for the
first time saw tiny nicks where she had been hit by flying glass. She bent down
and examined the cuts further. They were not deep, and were already clotting.
“All of our windows exploded! Do you know
what’s going on?” Sarah asked.
“There was an explosion at the high school.”
Lisa Orchard grew up loving books. She was hooked on mysteries by the fifth grade and even wrote a few of her own. She knew she wanted to be a writer even then. “The Super Spies and the High School Bomber” is the second book in the “Super Spies” series. Her first book was published in March of 2012 and it has received rave reviews.
After graduating from Central Michigan University with a Marketing Degree she spent many years in the insurance industry, pining to express her creative side. The decision to stay home with her children gave her the opportunity to follow her dream and become a writer. She currently resides in Rockford Michigan with her husband, Steve, and two wonderful boys. Currently, she’s working on the third novel that stars the same quirky teens. When she’s not writing she enjoys spending time with her family, running, hiking, and reading.
Happy Reading,
Rachel xoxo
Thanks Rachel for allowing me to show my excerpts to your followers! Your website is awesome! :)
ReplyDeleteThis one sounds interesting! I'm in the mood for some espionage after my latest read! Thanks for sharing :D
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by Kezia D. I just got 5 stars from a reviewer on this one. :) I think you'll like it! :) I'd love to hear your thoughts too!
ReplyDeleteThis book sounds really interesting! Exploding schools is not a common plotline, and it certainly sounds interesting ;) The writing is really good. I was hooked - I didn't want to the excerpt to end!
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing, Rachel :)
Thanks for stopping by Zoe! I appreciate your positive comments and you can find this book on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or the Astraea Press website. Here's the Amazon link http://www.amazon.com/Super-Spies-School-Bomber-ebook/dp/B008P8O7OY
ReplyDeleteI'd love to hear what you think of the entire story! :)