Gr 5-9-Jonah, Katherine, Chip, and Alex, all from the 21st century, find themselves trapped in the 15th century in Margaret Peterson Haddix's sequel (2009) to Found (2008, both S & S; Recorded Books, 2008). The boys are three of 36 children abducted from the past by people in the future who have mastered time travel. Jonah is unsure of his past identity, while Chip and Alex discover they are Prince Edward V and his brother Richard, the princes who supposedly perished in the tower at the hands of their uncle, King Richard III. Jonah and Katherine must protect the princes to save the lives of Alex and Chip and must correct the flaws caused by the boys' disappearances in order for their friends to return to the 21st century. Facing knights and different contenders for the throne, along with the foreign ideas and objects of the past, Jonah and his sister have their work cut out for them. With success comes the task of keeping other children from being doomed in the past. Haddix is planning sequels based on the cliffhanger ending. Chris Sorensen portrays perfectly the emotional states of the children and conveys the suspenseful nature of the plot without being overly dramatic. He does an excellent job with the characters from the different time periods, especially King Richard III, making him a forgivable villain. Those who enjoy historical fiction, intelligent novels, and suspense will relish the series.-Sarah Flood, Breckinridge County Public Library, Hardinsburg, KY (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Historical time travel for the middle-school crowd continues in this second installment of Haddix's latest series, The Missing. The first book (Found, 2008) set the premise36 endangered children have been snatched from history. Here, readers are catapulted immediately into 1483, with all of its inconveniences, bad food and lack of sewage treatment. Hero Jonah and his sister Katherine will try to save their friends from a nasty historical fate: Chip and Alex turn out to be the missing princes from the Tower, supposedly murdered by their uncle, Richard III. Fortunately the kids understand Middle English and can become invisible, but that doesn't prevent them from interfering with history, whatever its true path. Although pre-adolescent squabbles and tantrums abound, often to the level of annoyance, Jonah and friends show spunk and improvisational skills. Haddix conveys quite a bit of real history painlessly to her target audience and even mixes in some physics. So were the princes murdered? Was Richard III really as bad as Shakespeare portrayed him? Valuable fun for tweens. (Science fiction. 8-12) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Alex and Chip were snatched out of time but have now been sent back to their rightful lives in fifteenth-century England. Unfortunately, siblings Jonah and Katherine accidentally went with them. They are caught in the midst of a deadly royal scheme, and it will take more than knowledge of the future to rescue the two princes. Plenty of near misses and tension-building snafus are coupled with realistic bouts of homesickness and self-doubt in this second book in the Missing series. Having read Found (2008) is helpful but not obligatory, as long as readers can endure a chapter or two of confusion.--Welch, Cindy Copyright 2009 Booklist