Grace is dying to go on a mission for real when she gets older, but will she have to live in her brother's shadow for long?

I read this book as an adult and will certainly be recommending it to students in our school library. Although it has been edited to a reading age of 8 I feel that the story itself would be more suited to children of around that age and that older students with a younger reading ability might like the story but find it a little on the young side for them. There is serious training involved in becoming a Warden. At 13 Grace is just as good, if not better than her 15 year old brother at combat, first aid and other honed skills, but rules are rules and she has to wait two more years before she can attend any missions. In The Griffin Gate, Grace Griffin and her family who are wardens who use a Teleportation map to get to the scene of a crime in an instant. The Griffin's have been wardens for generations, but it's Grace who feels invisible as she can't go on missions yet, even though her brother can, and she thinks she is a better fighter than him during their training sessions. Although Grace has yet to complete her warden training there comes a moment in which she must answer a distress call alone. In doing so though, she puts not only herself at risk but her whole family.

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The book also feels more intricate, with more components working together to create the mystery. It feels a bit like Vashti Hardy was more confident with the format when writing this book so was able to spin more clues and more red-herrings into the book. (A pretty impressive feat for the size of it!)

Grace’s family have an important job. Grace, her mum and big brother Bren are Wardens of the GriffinThe Griffin Gate Book Review Cover Map. Grace’s grandmother invented the map which lies on a huge table showing all the towns and villages of Moreland.

About Vashti Hardy

Interest Age 8+ Reading Age 8 | Shortlisted for the Books for Younger Readers category, Children's Book Awards 2022 A small town claims a monster has been terrorising them. Grace investigates, keen to finally prove herself. All is not how it seems however and Grace stumbles across a plot not only to undermine her entire family as Wardens but to steal the Griffin Map too. This was such a great sci-fi, mystery read (I've tagged it as sci-fi because it's set in the future and has lots of mechanical devices which have been invented rather than the characters using magic to aid them but it could also fall into the category of fantasy). Now she has proven herself to attend the smaller crimes, she finds herself with a puzzling problem that leads to a castle ruin. Intriguing read and perfect for reluctant readers.