Bound To Stay Bound

Booklist - 02/15/2023 *Starred Review* The coauthors of the Accelerati Trilogy kick off an equally head-spinning sf series starring seemingly ordinary middle-schooler Noah Prime. Noah finds himself caught between rival groups of space aliens wearing creepy, ill-fitting human skins after discovering his useful but hard-to-control ability to take on the characteristics of any animal. As he works to stay alive and uncaptured, he finds allies in smart-mouthed little sister Andi, autistic best friend Ogden, and take-no-prisoners classmate Sahara—all of whom prove to have unusual abilities of their own. Unfortunately, it turns out that the fate of all life on Earth is at stake, and Noah might just have to give up his own life to save everyone else. In this first volume alone, the authors tuck in really big stakes, time travel, fiery explosions, sudden deaths, a monster-alien jailbreak, black ops (human and otherwise), flights to locales from from Iowa to Tibet, high tech, and low humor. And that’s not to mention the throwaway pop-culture references (“Klaatu barada nikto,” one escapee declaims) and an involuntary penguin mating dance. Events tie off (fairly) neatly, but readers who fasten their tusks on this opener won’t want to let go until the next one swims by. - Copyright 2023 Booklist.

School Library Journal - 05/05/2023 Gr 6 Up—The first book in this new series is too scattered to make its mark as a sci-fi adventure tale. Fourteen-year-old protagonist Noah Prime is outrageously athletic, but since his favorite sports keep getting canceled out of the blue, he rarely gets a chance to show off his talents. After a monkey-like display at a gymnastics tournament and spontaneously developing walrus blubber while trapped in a freezer, Noah discovers that his athletic aptitude is, in fact, superhuman: he can morph into any animal in the world to use its traits to his advantage. The book starts out quirky and witty as Noah and his friends test these abilities. Things start to go off the rails when Noah's house is attacked by aliens, who kidnap his parents and make him the target of an intergalactic manhunt. The plot begins to lose focus, splitting off into multiple, uninteresting perspectives that distract from what seems to be the book's main quest—Noah finding his parents and discovering the reason for his supernatural abilities. When the plots finally intersect, the conclusion is unsatisfying. A potential red flag for school collections—it's implied that a teacher is drinking alcohol while chaperoning a dance. VERDICT From time travel to aliens to shapeshifting to an apocalypse, this work proves there may be such a thing as too much science fiction in one book.—Maria Bohan - Copyright 2023 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.