Myself and my daughter aged 9 enjoyed the first book in this series, The Griffin Gate, and so were waiting in anticipation for the next book, The Puffin Portal. There is serious training involved in becoming a Warden. At 13 Grace is just as good, if not better than her 15 year old brother at combat, first aid and other honed skills, but rules are rules and she has to wait two more years before she can attend any missions. To be honest, I liked Grace's determination to show her family she had the skills to be able to fight crime and stop the culprits. Grace thinks she is ready when she answers a distress call from another village with her trustee Raven, Watson as her eyes and ears.

The book also feels more intricate, with more components working together to create the mystery. It feels a bit like Vashti Hardy was more confident with the format when writing this book so was able to spin more clues and more red-herrings into the book. (A pretty impressive feat for the size of it!)

If you were trying to book a reservation

Although Grace has yet to complete her warden training there comes a moment in which she must answer a distress call alone. In doing so though, she puts not only herself at risk but her whole family. As the world and premise has already been established by THE GRIFFIN GATE, THE PUFFIN PORTAL can dive right in to the mystery without having to spend so much time setting up the world. There's also more sleuthing in this book as Grace investigates the thefts and then a strange island with an abandoned castle (!!! As someone who grew up on Enid Blyton, I love a good crumbling castle full of mystery!) An age-old story of a younger sibling trying to prove herself, with an ingenious fantasy twist. The setting is a place of mechanical animals, inventive gadgets, and portals. A touch of Steampunk! When she investigates the common clues are related to birds, but how can that be? Besides her own robot raven named Watson, birds can’t open doors and why would they steal wire? She and Watson decide to do a stake out in a small town and discover much more than they were imagining, and even solve the problem of how busy they have all been lately. This is Vashti's first Barrington Stoke title and the good news is its part of a series with The Puffin Portal coming soon.

Interest Age 8+ Reading Age 8 | Shortlisted for the Books for Younger Readers category, Children's Book Awards 2022 For years Grace's family have been wardens of the Griffin map, using its teleport technology to help people and fight crime across the land of Moreland. At thirteen, Grace is too young become a warden, but she longs to go on missions herself. After all, if her brother Bren can do it, why can't she? So when Grace finds herself alone with the map when a distress call comes in, she jumps at the chance to prove she's up to the task. But the map transports Grace to a remote village where nothing is quite as it seems. Has she landed right in the middle of a treacherous scheme? About This Edition ISBN: Having just recently been trained up and allowed to go out on simple missions on her own, Grace has been looking into a string of odd robberies across Moreland. There have been no clues left at the scenes, and only strange items have gone missing, such as a tool here and there, and the occasional item of food. Determined to find out if there could be a connection between these crimes Grace sets out to find answers with the help of her robotic raven Watson.

LoveReading4Kids Says

Grace is dying to go on a mission for real when she gets older, but will she have to live in her brother's shadow for long? Whilst it is a fairly simple mystery, this is a children's book after all, it's still one that will keep younger readers interested. And because the mystery isn't the most important part of the book, it doesn't really matter if some of the readers figure it out early on. The real heart of the book, instead, is the relationship that forms between Grace and Tom, the young boy found living in the ruined island castle. Hardy does a good job of building something between the two children, and leading you to come to the conclusions that Grace does; as well as decisions that will lead to a lovely resolution. Very soon the two of them start to believe that the crimes could be connected, thanks to several witnesses having reported seeing a puffin in the area, and a strange feather being found at one of the crime scenes. But how can puffins be involved? Staking out a likely target, Grace and Watson see a puffin breaking into a shop and making off with a loaf of bread. Following the bird through a strange portal the two of them find themselves on a remote island with a tumbling castle.