Alex Rider has been through a lot fo r his fourteen years. He's been shot at by international terro r ists, chased down a mountainside on a makeshift snowboard, a nd has stood face-to-face with pure evil. Twice, young Alex has managed to save the wo r ld. a nd twice, he has almost been killed doing it. But now Alex faces something even mo r e dangerous. The desperation of a man who has lost everything he cared fo r : his country a nd his only son. A man who just happens to have a nuclear weapon a nd a serious grudge against the free wo r ld. To see his beloved Russia once again be a dominant power, he will stop at nothing. Unless Alex can stop him first... Uniting fo r ces with America's own CIA fo r the first time, teen spy Alex Rider battles terro r fr om the sun-baked beaches of Miami all the way to the barren ice fields of no r thernmost Russia. Come along fo r the thrilling ride of a lifetime.