The Lighthouse Land (The Lighthouse Trilogy) - Softcover

Adrian McKinty, now a US citizen, was born and grew up in Carrickfergus, Northern Ireland. Educated at Oxford University, he then immigrated to New York City, where he lived in Harlem for five years, working in bars and on construction crews, and enjoying a stint as a bookseller. He is the author of several highly acclaimed novels for adults, including a Publisher’s Weekly Book of the Year. He currently lives in Denver, where he teaches high school.

Grade 6–9—Thirteen-year-old Jamie O'Neill and his mother leave New York City's Harlem for an island off the coast of Ireland, where Jamie discovers that he's a lord, a descendant of the Irish Kings. Despite his muteness after losing his left arm to bone cancer, he befriends talkative, clever Ramsay. While exploring a 1000-year-old lighthouse, the boys find an ancient gold object that lets them travel to an alien planet light-years away. On Altair, a pointed-eared, eight-fingered girl named Wishaway is awaiting the return of Lord Ui Neill, whom she believes will save her world from invaders from the Alkhavans, who travel in iceships and enslave the people they conquer. Jamie finds that on Altair he still has his arm and can speak. The planet is technologically stuck in 1607 due to a scarcity of natural resources, so Jamie and Ramsay use their knowledge of chemistry to show the citizens how to make "Greek Fire" (sulfur, quicklime, and petroleum) to burn their enemies' iceships. Before they can begin to fight, everyone on the planet starts getting ill. Will they find a cure and can they defeat the Alkhavans? This science-fiction adventure story has an interesting setting. However, the plot lacks a sense of real conflict, the ending is resolved too neatly, and all but the main characters lack depth.—Sharon Rawlins, NJ Library for the Blind and Handicapped, Trenton
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