Charlie Friesen

Charlie Friesen
Raven's Gate
Anthony Horowitz
Fantasy
Holiday
pg. 45

1. Right now in my book, Matthew Freeman, or Matt as he calls himself is living with a foster mother in Yorkshire County in England. His own parents had died in a car crash five years ago and until a few days ago, he had been living with his aunt in Ipswich, England. He had a friend named Kelvin, who was sort of a delinquent and took Matt under his wing. Matt himself also himself became somewhat of a delinquent. One day, Kelvin had found this old warehouse that only had one security guard that was normally sleeping, and was stocked with new DVDs and video games. So they go to "take" some of the inventory from that warehouse when things go terribly wrong. The security guard was fully awake and as soon as Kelvin broke through the door, an alarm went off. The security guard had found Matt, when Kelvin threw his knife at the guard and wounded him. Both of them were almost immediately picked up by the police. Kelvin was locked up but Matt was given a second chance through the LEAF program. In this deal, he would get a foster mother, who turned out to be Mrs. Deverill, and would go live with her. Matt accepted and he moved with Mrs. Deverill to Lesser Malling. As soon as he got there , strange things began to happen. After a tour of the house Mrs. Deverill led Matt up to his room, where her cat bit Matt. He started to go dizzy and hear strange voices and I left off just as Matt fell unconscious.

2. So far, this book seems very interesting. Although I have only gotten past the introduction, where I left off seemed to be very interesting. I like the way that Horowitz writes, and after reading the Alex Rider series, I thought that reading the Gatekeepers series (the one Raven's Gate belongs to) would be a good read. So far Horowitz has not disappointed me. This is quite a bit different from the Alex Rider series, so I am interested to see how Horowitz writes this book. I am more looking forward to what Horowitz has to offer in this book, but it has also been good up to the point that I have read. This I can tell will be a good novel, and series.

3.. A theme that I have noticed so far is that Matt has been unwanted. He only had one friend when he was in Ipswich, who turned out not to really be a friend when Kelvin tried to tell the police that it was Matt who stabbed the security guard. His aunt that Matt was living with also did not really want Matt either. She said that Matt was never grateful, and that she was never close to Matt's parents. Even Mrs Deverill did not seem to want Matt, she would not really talk to him on the bus, and she and Matt had not lived with each other long enough to feel comfortable with each other. Mrs. Deverill is a strict old lady who was not going to give Matt any affection any time soon. Everywhere Matt has lived except at his parent's house he has been unwanted. No one has shown him any love in five years.

4. My favorite character so far has been Matt. I feel sorry for him that he has to go through all of the traumas that he has gone through. Also, I admire him for still having some hope left after all that he has been through. He is also the main character, so you have to like him or you will not like the book. I feel as if Matt has been cheated a bit, and so that makes me feel sorry for him, which is why he is my favorite character. I also think that because Matt seems to have this resilience, that he will be a very good character later on in the book. Also, he is my age, 14, and I can relate to him in some ways. All these reasons make his my favorite character.

5. My least favorite character is Kelvin. He never really was a close friend, and it took the incident in the warehouse for Matt to fully realize that. Kelvin was a bad influence on Matt, and caused him to get into a lot of trouble that he would not have gotten into on his own. At the warehouse, after Kelvin was caught, he tried to convince the police that it was Matt that had stabbed the police officer. It was outright lying, and a breech of their friendship, a friendship they never had. Kelvin was almost like the False Prophet, he offered friendship, trust and caring, but all he gave was selfishness, and got Matt into a huge amount of trouble.

6. A prediction about what will happen next is based off mainly the title. When Matt wakes up from being unconscious, he will probably find himself with Mrs. Deverill and maybe one other person. Mrs. Deverill will have something to do with the "Gatekeepers", and Matt is probably one of them too. Just before Matt went unconscious, a voice said "'One of the five!'", so there are probably four other gatekeepers that he might meet. The way Mrs. Deverill might be acting suspicious could mean that she is someone who is against the gatekeepers. But either way, Mrs. Deverill will play a big par in the rest of the book.