This book three in the City Spies series features the gang of city-re-named tween spies – Paris, Sydney, Rio, Kat (Katmandu) -- running a chess tournament con/operation to get a North Korean super-mind to defect to MI6 before Umbra kidnaps him.
Except, nothing's ever that easy, and hey, this is chess, featuring minds trained in tactics, seeing plays within plays, many moves ahead of the game.
Paris is the one posing as a chess player. To get a message to the defector without his captors knowing, Paris has to throw a game – maneuver his pieces to a point where they spell out a message for the defector's father to decipher.
Meanwhile, Sydney is pretending to be a fashion reporter, joined at the hip with a tween star whose super-rich father may be working for Umbra and trying to steal away the chess wunderkind. It's up to her to figure out what the connection is between the billionaire dad, a boy band and Umbra's plans to steal the chess player.
Paris makes an admirable showing at the chess tournament, and his ploy -- the message – gets across, but Umbra and North Korea are already ahead of the spy kids and have plans of their own.
It all comes together in a delicious ending. This is a great read and perfect gift for the holiday season! Enjoy.
