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This novel, while inclusive to an african american character, is archaic in its depiction of gender roles; females are damsels in distress, domestic, and ineffective in exploring and controlling the portals. The youngest child and only daughter of the King family, expresses disappointment in not being able to help like her brothers do, the father placates her with praising her for the deeds she does do, but they are primarily insignificant. As a former soldier, I find that limitation upsetting because I know that women are very capable in violent and strenuous situations. However, Liparulo is a skilled writer who creates enough tension through out the story to motivate the reader to continue reading.

A great activity to accompanying the series is a creative writing assignment or competition that reflects traveling through time and experiencing historically significant events for all world cultures. The child writing the story is the protagonist, and they use the secret hallway with the portals as the prompt. ( )

"XANDER! I swear, I'm going to kill you!" those words and "XANDER, I HATE YOU!!" are missing from this book ... but I screamed them a lot at the text. I was even thinking of pausing and not finishing the series right away -- taking a break from Xander's stupidity -- but I absolutely want to know how things turn out and what more stupid, idiotic things Xander does next! And now what stupid stuff David does!

Xander's obviously not my favorite character, by the way. And if anything happens to Keal because of his stupidity ... >:-[

On to Book 6 :-)

Adrianne ( )

Such an unknown series, but it's definitely intense. I'd compare it to Ted Dekker's series. ( )

Finally, the Christian fiction element shows up. Although I actually liked the idea - it was contrived, but not overly so, which is the problem I usually have with Christian fiction - I wasn't impressed with the execution of it. (Happened to be reading this book on Easter weekend, oddly enough.)

**SPOILERS**

Okay, so you blip into ancient times and you are actually witnessing the progress of Jesus on la via dolorosa. And out of a family of five, only the 10-year-old tries to get closer??? It's pretty clear who it is and what's happening, so that's no excuse. Wouldn't you want to record every little detail in your memory? Even if you could never tell anyone what you saw except the people who were there with you, wouldn't you at least walk a little closer to the street, or drop to your knees in prayer or astonishment? But no, there's almost the impression that the rest of the family is kind of hanging back, letting David have this moment to himself, smiling fondly at him and not really impressed with what they are witnessing.

But outside of that quibble, the series was tied up nicely, even if it did end as action/adventure instead of horror. ( )