Turn Off the Lights

Turn Off the Lights
by Phillip Gwynne
Recommended Ages: 13+

Dom Silvagni of suburban Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia, is a pretty good middle distance runner, a not very attentive student at his pricy boys' prep, and terrible at telling the girl he likes that he likes her. But that's old news. Lately – like, since his 15th birthday – he's secretly become an errand-boy for a secretive criminal organization called The Debt. He doesn't know who they are, where they are, or what they really want. He only knows that if he doesn't complete six tasks for them, they'll cut off his leg. It almost happens in this book – more or less as a reminder not to mess with them. They seemingly know everything he does, everywhere he goes, even what he's thinking. It's eerie. The poor kid can't trust anybody. And then he finds out that his second task is to make all the lights in the affluant suburb of Halcyon Grove go dark during Earth Hour, only a few days away.

Suddenly, Dom is a star student, organizing a class trip to a nuclear power plant. He also makes amazing progress as a hacker, thanks to a scary computer The Debt gave him. But making sure those lights go out is still a tall order, considering that his photo is on file with plant security, and he doesn't have a driving license, and he can't ask anybody to help him, and he can't let a group of ecoterrorists accomplish the same task even though he sympathizes with them up to a point. (That point being their willingness to run over a kid who gets in their way.) So, he's actually got to sabotage the other group while at the same time committing the impossible act of ecoterrorism himself, and get home in time to stop the neighborhood bully from taking advantage of the girl of his dreams.

Dom faces emotional conflicts galore. He starts to suspect that his father is up to something shady. He has to keep secrets from the girl he has feelings about, even though those very secrets are pushing her away. He feels responsible for the kid down the street even though he's more of a rival than a friend. He experiences betrayal, jealousy, humiliation, paranoia – though that's not really the word for it when they're really messing with you. He makes some poor decisions, particularly as a runner. And he pushes through all kinds of reasonable fear and hesitancy to tackle a secret-agent-sized assignment, even though he's just a kid. It's a thrill ride, all the more thrilling for how nearly it goes totally out of control. And as resourceful, reflective and downright tough as he is, Dom's the right kid for it.

This is "installment two" of The Debt, a six-book series by an Australian young adult and children's author that I found in an independent, local bookstore all the way up in Park Rapids, Minnesota, but that you can't buy at Amazon for less than like $50. Viva small business! Book 3 is Bring Back Cerberus.