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    Max and the Gatekeeper
    Max and the Gatekeeper
    Max and the Gatekeeper
    Ebook309 pages4 hours

    Max and the Gatekeeper

    By James Todd Cochrane

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    About this ebook

    A war has been waging for centuries; a magical and technological battle between good and evil. This conflict will affect life everywhere, but not everyone is aware it exists. When twelve-year old Max Rigdon is sent to stay with his grandfather for the summer, he unwillingly enters the fight.

    The day Max steps off the bus he is marked with an evil curse and immediately becomes the target of evil men and creatures with designs on ruling the universe. Not only does this curse cause Max physical pain but it allows his enemies to track and find him. He soon learns that the reason for this unwanted attention is because his grandfather is the keeper of a gateway; a powerful machine that makes travel to hundreds of strange unknown worlds possible. The enemy will do anything to gain possession of this power in their quest to control all worlds.

    With the help of his friend Cindy and others, Max must quickly learn the necessary skills to survive if he is to avoid the deadly trap that has been planned for him and his grandfather. A trap that has been decades in the making with Max as the missing piece. If successful it will change life as we know it.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJames Todd Cochrane
    Release dateNov 16, 2012
    ISBN9780988211018
    Max and the Gatekeeper
    Author

    James Todd Cochrane

    James Todd Cochrane was born in Fremont, California. He received his BA from Utah State University, where he majored in Business Information Systems with a minor in German.A writer since elementary school, he published his first novel, Max and the Gatekeeper, in 2007. The sequels, The Hourglass of Souls and The Descendant and the Demon’s Fork, followedHe now lives in Madison, Wisconsin, where he writes part-time while working as a computer programmer.His first novel, Max and the Gatekeeper, is on the Accelerated Readers List and was a 2010-2011 Alaska Battle Book.

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    • 4/5
      Mr. Cochrane’s debut novel is quite excellent. It struck me as the type of novel that children, more likely boys than girls (but hey, it would have been something I would have loved when I was younger), would absolutely adore. The story captures the imagination. The ability to travel to different worlds and the use of magic definitely are wonderfully done. The characters are well written, the villains disreputable and the good guys loveable. The plot is absorbing and exciting. Everything about this book is great for children because it is easy to follow. If you read it to your children, you’ll probably love it too!
    • 4/5
      Max Rigdon is not happy that he has to spend the summer with his grandfather – he’d much rather stay home and play baseball with his friends. His spirits pick up a bit when he quickly makes friends with next door neighbor Cindy, but he is uneasy. A mysterious stranger threatened him during his bus ride to his grandfather’s house and there are a lot of strange people hanging around his grandfather’s house. The other kids in town also seem a bit odd. Before long Max’s grandfather tells him what is going on and soon Max finds himself traveling to different worlds, learning magic, meeting magical creatures, and in a battle to save his family and friends as well as his own life.“Max and the Gatekeeper” gets off to a fast start with Max being threatened by a stranger and never slows down. Author James Todd Cochrane does a wonderful job of blending the real world with the fantasy worlds in the novel and all are believable. Max is a good creation, a young boy who reluctantly leaves his mother and friends to visit the grandfather he barely knows and wondering how his father died. Cindy is also well done as a young girl who doesn’t fit into her town but isn’t quite sure why. The fantasy characters like Yelka and Marko are well done and Ell in particular is a character that readers will remember long after they have finished reading the book. The different worlds that Max and Cindy visit are well written and I could picture them almost as if I was watching a movie. There are plenty of exciting moments in the book particularly towards the end. While there is a nifty twist in the book, for the most part the characters are either purely good or purely evil and at least in this first book in the series Cochrane doesn’t take any real chances and good easily (perhaps too easily at times) triumphs over evil.“Max and the Gatekeeper” is a good fantasy novel for young (and old) adults.

    Book preview

    Max and the Gatekeeper - James Todd Cochrane

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