Scorpia Rising by Anthony Horowitz

Scorpia Rising is the final installment of the Alex Rider series. It was crazy (in a good way) like all the previous books and I loved it. I cried. Yes, I cried. Alex didn't deserve all this stuff. He's only fifteen! He deserves a normal life! And it doesn't help the Jack Starbright died. She was his caretaker, and he trusted and loved her so much! How could Anthony Horowitz just take her like that? That made me really upset. Anyway, this story was just outstanding. The characters, the plot, it all lined up and created a great story. :) LOL, I couldn't believe Smithers was actually a young Irishman!! :D *Sigh* I suppose it was a good ending. Sabina and Alex are together!! :D I also can't believe Alan Blunt's job was taken away from him. That was unexpected.

At the beginning, a man named Zeljan Kurst, leader of Scorpia, is asked by a Greek man to return the Elgin Marbles back to Greece. Zeljan agrees for a large sum of money. He assigns this to the new Scorpia member, Razim. Razim is a totally emotionless man that studies the art of pain. He creates the Horseman file. Also, Julius Grief, the clone of Hugo Grief (Point Blanc), and a complete look-alike to Alex Rider, is broken out of jail and is working with Razim. Alex Rider is a fifteen year old boy. One day, when he thinks his spy life is all over and he can live a normal life, a sniper tries to kill him (and of course he escapes out of that). After following the sniper man, he finds out that it was supposedly some mission and wrecks the helicopter that contains the sniper. A lot of stuff happens and soon Alex is again recruited by MI6 and is an undercover spy at a school which recently hired a retired war hero, Erik Guntar. Alex happened to overhear Erik going to the House of Gold and follows him, which blows up. Immediately, he is kidnapped by CIA agents believing he is an assassin. There, Alex learns that the secretary of state is going to be assassinated. He returns to Jack and they book plane tickets but both are shortly kidnapped and taken to Razim's fort. Jack dies there by being blown up and Alex is forced to watch it through security footage. He was a subject to Razim about the topic of mental pain. Alex is taken back to Cairo where the secretary of state will make her speech. He is in the car with Guntar though he manages to finish him off with a scorpion. He then stops Julius Grief from assassinating the woman and kills him too. Alex than leads a group of CIA agents to Razim's fort, and Razim is killed by a salt pit which works like quicksand. At the end of the book, Mrs. Jones is now the head of MI6, Scorpia is completely finished, and Alex is adopted by the Pleasures.