Kitty Hawk and the Icelandic Intrigue by Iain Reading
Genre: Adventure, Mystery
Published by: Amazon
Pages: 275
Format: Paperback
Rating: ★★★★
Where to Find: Goodreads | Amazon

I’ve made it to the third book in the Kitty Hawk series! This time, our favourite aviator detective is travelling to Iceland, land of vikings, volcanoes and ice. (Well, obviously.)

This is definitely the most educational of all the books so far. You learn so much about Iceland as a country, which was a pleasant surprise. I really hope that the rest of the books in the series give more historical and cultural information about where Kitty is visiting, since geographically, she’s going everywhere! There was definitely less ‘story telling’, where a character just dictates what Kitty and the reader needed to know, which I found refreshing. It was more ‘show-not-tell’.

The classic tropes of Kitty Hawk fiction were there: maps, images, a small relationship with a local (even if she might have imagined him), a helpful and friendly host, plane journeys and conversations with the ‘little voice’ in her head. I love that there are a selection of things that define these books and set them apart from other fiction in this genre.

Much like with the second book, this book took place on a smaller scale, dealing with a family trauma, but with a few international thugs added in for good measure. Kitty had the most, well, adventureous adventure yet, throwing herself in the face of danger, and having to escape from the hands of criminals, echoing the first book. But Kitty has come a long way since then and her reputation is becoming global.

Once the criminals were sorted, there were issues much closer to home. Erik was your classic ‘Scooby Do’ villain, that would have got away with it if it wasn’t for meddling kids, or should that be meddling Kitty? I thought the environmental-political agenda was an interesting addition to the plot, and the actions of the villain were certainly realistic.

Overall, this was the most thrilling Kitty Hawk yet. Car chases, explosions, volancic eruptions and hospital visits – Kitty is getting herself into more and more trouble the further around the globe she goes. I give this book 4 stars. Now that I’ve read the current collected Kitty Hawk series, I’m very interested to see how the protagonist develops and what she does next!