Kiki Strike: Inside the Shadow City

Completed on 4.20.08

Genre: Mystery/Adventure

Rating: 4.5/5 (I loved it!)

This is a modern day Nancy Drew Mystery with strong, smart female characters. The story does not completely come together until in the end, and an evil character escapes setting up a sequel to this fast paced book. It is set in

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NYC. Kiki Strike is a mysterious girl who loves danger. Kiki recuits four other girls to join the crime fighting groups called the Irregulars. Betty is a master at disguises, Oona is a master forger and computer hacker, DeeDee is a chemist, Luz is mecanical engineer, and Ananka a urban archaelogist and owns one of the most useful libraries in all of NYC. (p.83)

The girls led by Kiki Strike set out to discover the underground of NYC called Shadow City. In Shadow City the Irregulars encounter rats and find skeletons, treasures, ancient coins, conterfiet items and many secret doors. Little do the girls know that Kiki is really a Princess looking for a pink diamond ring that belonged to her murdered mother, the Queen. The ring reveals the person responsible for her death.

There are many twists and turns to this book, it keeps you guessing and reading Shannnon Burge

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A total page-turner: the writing is sharp, the characterization interesting, and the setting fascinating. Really, really nicely done.

This is a book I discovered not from reviews in print journals, but from my fellow kidslit bloggers who simply raved about it. And that is exactly what I am going to do too. It is the story of Ananka Fishbein, who looks out her window one day to discover a giant sinkhole in the park across the

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street. She decides to explore it and by doing so, changes her life. Inside the sinkhole she finds a fully decorated room and a book that leads her to understand the dirtier and darker side of New York City, including the Shadow City, a warren of connected rooms deep beneath the ground. After her adventure, she meets the strange Kiki Strike, a tiny girl who is dangerous and mysterious. Ananka then finds herself on an adventure with the Irregulars, a group of preteen girls who all have different talents that will enable them to explore the Shadow City. Author Miller has created a riveting book filled with twists and turns, betrayals and lifelong friendships, populated with preteen girls who have real adventures. It is an amazing triumph to create female preteen characters who care about both style and explosives. This is a girl book that rocks, that captures exactly what girls really want: to be dangerous and to have adventures, but not be boyish in the least. The writing is witty, vivacious and pure fun just like the characters. Miller has also added guides throughout the book on subjects like detecting a liar, snakebites, and following someone without being found out.

Run and get this for any brave preteen girl who has spunk and a thirst for adventure. It is books like this that make me sigh about the lack of real modern adventure books for girls. Tamora Pierce is my hero for featuring girls in her stories that are just as tough and strong as the boys, but we have needed a modern story that features great female characters as well. Kiki Strike fills that void, and does it with great style.

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An outcast girl who attends a posh private school in New York City finds out about a secret labrynth of tunnels under the city. She finds other girls all with special, dangerous talents and they setout to investigate. A very fun adventure.

There’s a shadow city beneath the streets of New York, and no one seems to know about it. That is, until a sinkhole occurs in the park across the street from Ananka Fishbein’s house, and she sees a small, blonde elfin girl climb up out of the hole. When she meets Kiki Strike, Ananka’s

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formerly unexceptional life changes forever. Suddenly she belongs to a world of spies, mystery, crime and adventure, joining an elite group of talented girls hand-picked by Kiki Strike to discover the secrets of the subterranean world.
Fast-paced, full of suspense, and complete with Ananka’s notes on what every girl needs to know to become an adventurer. This is a great book!

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Summary: A mysterious fifth grader has been recruiting from various Girl Scout troops for a secret club of her own.

The Take-Away: It's difficult to balance believeable situations with fictional teenagers. All too often, the author credits them with characteristics that aren't quite right, or

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blatently wrong. Miller gives her group great characteristics with the appropriate backstories so that their extraordinary levels of competency and intelligence don't seem unbelieveable.

The premise is discovering a third city below New York City. The girls investigate at night, with various excuses that keep their parents from discovering their true activities. Mapping the city isn't the only thing that Kiki Strike has in mind, but the others don't discover it until the middle of the novel. Again, this technique makes their extraordinary adventure seem plausible.

The best part of this book is the practical advice at the end of select chapters. Practical advice about changing your appearance, following someone and being invisible. Just the sort of thing a girl needs to know.

Recommendation: Great for anyone in need of some girl power.

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A secret Shadow City exists deep below New York City. When a sinkhole opens in front of Ananka Fishbein's apartment, she is lured to this underground city by a strange creature that pops its head up from the hole. Her fascination grows with both this new world she has discovered and a mysterious

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student at her school named Kiki Strike who tells the principal that when she grows up she wants to be "dangerous". People may think young teenage girls are harmless, but Ananka, Kiki, and a few of their remarkable friends band together to explore the Shadow City and fight crime. Great adventure story that shows true girl power.

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(#28 in the 2005 book challenge)

Very fun girl power fiction for the young teen set. A group of girls explore hidden tunnels deep under New York City. It's got a real graphic novel/comic book feel (but it's a regular prose book, ya know?) and it's clever and funny and has a touch of magical realism

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-- it's not quite realistic but the lines kind of move around in a neat way. One thing jumped out at me that I found a little odd. There's a lot of referencing of things that girls are supposed to do, or not do -- like the narrator will mention that "everybody" expects girls to be demure and "nobody" expects girls to be assertive ... maybe I'm naive, but aren't we past that? I mean, I thought we were at the point where people realize that girls can do math and play sports, but are still mired in that trickier zone where sexism and gender roles are still institutionalized and the pitfalls are lurking under the surface as opposed to up in your face and the danger is that some people think that the problem is over because duh, girls play sports now. Oh well, I'm probably thinking too hard on that. Unfortunately we're right back to the sequel problem because this is set up for a series of Kiki Strike adventures, all of which I will probably read.

Grade: A+
Recommended: To people looking for new, interesting YA fiction with strong female characters. It's a fairly long novel, but I think it would be an easy hook for young teens who are reluctant or picky readers.

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I've been reading a lot of mystery novels featuring strong, adventurous girls, recently, but this is a standout. The plot is creative, with a number of twists and turns and edge-of-your-seat moments. The author uses unique and quirky details to bring out the character of each girl, and these

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details bring the story to life. I particularly enjoyed the brief interludes addressing the reader with advice about topics like how to tell if someone is lying. The "irregulars," a band of girls chosen for their unique abilities and adventurous spirit, form a sisterhood that will be the envy of adolescent girls everywhere.

A brief caution, there are a few gruesome details that younger girls may find unsettling.

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I really wanted to like this book. It sounds funny and light and interesting. It's another book about spies, except these are normal, everyday kind of girls who learn how to become spies by following Kiki Strike. Except that's not really how it happens. Kiki puts together a group of gifted girls, a

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chemistry wiz, a forger, the daughter of costume designers who makes great disguises, etc, and our main character, who seems normal. They do learn from Kiki, and at the end of each chapter is a little summary of what our main character has learned throughout the years, which is sometimes a little foreshadowing into the next chapter. Those were interesting most of the time. The story wasn't bad, it's a great premise and the whole 'Shadow City' thing is pretty awesome, but it felt like something was missing.

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Very hip and cool chick mystery. I love the characters and how tough they are. Hopefully book 2 will be just as good.

Billed as a female Alex Rider, but it falls far short of that. It started out good, but the characters were stereotypical, especially the bad girls.

Ananka is yearning for a life of excitement, but she doesn't realize it until it the morning she looks out her window to discover a sink hole in the park outside her window and the secret room that lies beneath. Before long she is discovering a secret city with Kiki Strike and a highly talented

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group of girls called the Irregulars. The girls seem unstoppable until an accident occurs that leaves them doubting the motives of their fearless leader and causes a split. When girls across the city begin to go missing, the Irregulars must ban together to save the day.

I picked this book up on a whim while visiting a book store in Bay St. Louis. For a book that I chose based on the cover, I couldn't have been more pleased. This adventure tale moved quickly and kept me entertained the whole time. I loved the strong young women and the interesting setting. I'm looking forward to getting my hands on the second book in the series.

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When I met Kirsten Miller I told her I wished a book like this had been published when I was a kid and I meant it. It is in my top ten of adolescent fiction that promotes "girl-power." If you have a daughter, this book must be added to her shelf. It's also a great book for those of you who just

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love books about New York.

PS--Miller writes the best blog in town. Check it out on the Kiki Strike website!

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While Kiki Strike is obviously a book aimed at teenage girls, you won’t find any lip-gloss, ‘cute boys’, or love triangles in these pages. This book is a punch in the face of everybody who thinks that girls can’t do whatever boys can do. By the end of a few chapters, every pre-teen who

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picks up this book will wish she were as dangerous as Kiki Strike – so it is fantastic to see that Miller has included frequent ‘how to’ sections, filled with information you won’t learn in school, from how to be a master of disguise to how to incapacitate a kidnapper. It is obvious from reading this book that Miller has put a lot of good, hard research into her writing, and it adds to the appeal of the novel immensely.

As a mystery novel, Kiki Strike scores very well. Its number-one asset is that it is delightfully unpredictable, with a plot that twists, turns and remains complex and surprising to the very end. The mistrust that Miller plants is especially appealing, forcing readers to make difficult decisions about who is lying and who is telling the truth. Anyone who can guess the ending of this intriguing novel should be very pleased with herself.

Despite her fantastic storylines, however, Miller has clearly forgotten what it was like to be twelve years old. It is very difficult for an adult to write from the perspective of a child, and, like many others before her, Miller has been unsuccessful. The narration of the book rings with a mature, controlled and elaborate style that simply does not befit a twelve-year-old girl. The social hierarchies of the bullies at Ananka’s school are reminiscent of B-grade Hollywood films – most definitely not the stuff of real life. The entire novel works a whole lot better if the reader simply discards the fact that the main characters are pre-teens, especially considering the murder, treason and grand-scale theft that Miller seems to think many young girls are capable of.

Once you ignore its unrealistic aspects, however, Kiki Strike is a unique and stimulating novel that will fascinate and surprise its readers. Recommended for pre-teen to teenage girls who want something more from their reading.

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This book definatly goes under the W-O-W category. Was Out of this World. It was a book I read around seventh grade and I was shocked and happy with the end. But it wasn't just the ending that had me going. The whole time your reading this book, your asking yourself, "Did that really happen!?" and

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"What happens next?" It's one of thos books that I didn't put down the entire time I was reading it. It's something I'm going to introduce to every friend I have. Good job Kirsten Miller.

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This was such a good mystery! The book starts off with a girl looking out her window and seeing a giant sinkhole taking up half a park with a small figure waving then jumping in. Without giving it a second thought, the girl grabs a jacket and runs outside to follow the mysterious creature down the

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hole to go explore. This is definitely a book for the curious, the adventurous, and for people not afraid to break the rules.

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A group of geeky girls runs around the shadow city of old New York? Scheming princesses plan spy versus spy espionage? This quirky, stylish story is filled with random, yet effective humor. The plot is so purposely absurd as to not even factor in discussions about the book. This is a funny, nicely

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told character study of a weird group of girls who perhaps are best described as Brownies grown up and gone bad in the underbelly of New York. Readers will learn how to disguise themselves and avoid kidnapping. A fun read recommended for both middle school and high school libraries, this one has cult classic potential!

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I really enjoyed the twists and turns this book took. Miller has developed a nicely complicated story with lots of adventure.

Being an ARC, there were a few times the errors were bothersome, but not enough to ruin the storyline.

I'd recommend this book to anyone looking for an interesting

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mystery/adventure story...and especially if they are looking for the main characters being girls.

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This was a great book. I began reading it almost as soon as I got it - and it was genuinely laugh-out-loud funny. It tells the story of Kiki Strike, the unusual but brilliant girls who gathers an eclectic set of girls with various skills around her in order to explore a series of secret tunnels

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under New York City.

I cannot explain how much I loved this book. It is really rich with details, and it feels really real. The characters were so real to me, that I actually had to put the book down for a couple of weeks, because I was afraid that something bad was going to happen to them, and I just couldn't deal with that. And one particularly nice touch was the little 'advice columns' at the end of each chapter.

My recommendation would be to read this, but try not to get as invested as I did, because it regretted putting it down when I reached the end.

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great book

Excellent for late primary, early high school reader. Lots of interesting real life tidbits interspersed in the story.

This spy novel written for girls was excellent. I read it on the recommendation of a patron, and I wasn't disappointed. The "irregulars" are strong girls in their own right. I would recommend this to readers of mystery young adult novels or just girls interested in strong lead characters.

A worthy read if ever I've met one.

There is so much to recommend this book that it is hard to know where to begin! I wanna be a girl scout! I want to be dangerous! I want to be an irregular!!! I knew almost immediately what great hands I was in; Kirsten Miller's rapid-fire and hilarious mind is

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stamped on every single page. But it was when I was halfway through the book (and out in the weeds as far as the mystery was concerned) when I realized I was up against a mystery as formidable as one from Agatha Christy. I love good mysteries. Don't get me wrong, I like stories where I can see the ending coming a mile away. When I first saw Star Wars, and that Death Star showed up on the screen? Yeah, it didn't take more than a few seconds to know exactly how THAT was going to end. But, to be midway through an entertaining read, and NOT know where the author is taking me? That is not only rare, but wonderful! And I learned all kinds of stuff I never knew! And about subjects I never thought I would learn things about! :)

Thank you, Kirsten Miller, for setting Kiki Strike loose upon the world. I will never walk the streets of New York City and look them the same way again. Now where did they hang those pirate heads? Let me get out my maps!

I can't wait to read book two (which I purchased before I even finished the first one), but now I'm off to either book 2 in the Sisters Grimm series, or Lemony Snicket's Ersatz Elevator. Somebody got a coin I can flip?

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