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The Chaos Code

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THE CHAOS CODE; Justin Richards; Juvenile/Young Adult fiction; London: Bloomsbury, 2007; 388pp.

I really liked Justin Richards' The Death Stealer, and kept reading The Chaos Code because I thought it would get better, but it was a slog to the end. The book has a promising premise:
a power-mad archaeologist wants the secrets of the ancients so he can rule the world, and in this narrative, he has created a computer program that can raise golems and avatars from the earth, air, wind, and fire. Matt and Robin, their parents and other helpers, possibly from the lost continent of Atlantis itself, must fight to save the world. One wonders how such a story could be boring, but the characters are thinly drawn, their feelings for one another are either sketchy or inexplicable and explanation trumps excitement in what should have been a thriller.
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