Lady Friday (Keys to the Kingdom, Book 5) - Softcover

Garth Nix

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0007175094 ISBN 13: 9780007175093

Publisher: HarperCollins Children's Books, 2007

Synopsis

Friday is here! The race is on to find the secret of the Middle House. The fifth eagerly awaited installment in Garth Nix's best selling fantasy series,The Keys to the Kingdom. Arthur Penhaligon's adventures in the House get ever more perilous as the week unfolds. On the fifth day, there was fear! Four of the seven Trustees have been defeated and their Keys taken, but for Arthur, the week is still getting worse. Suzy Blue and Fred Initial Numbers Gold have been captured by the Piper, and his New Nithling army still controls most of the Great Maze. Superior Saturday is causing trouble wherever she can, including turning off all the elevators in the House and blocking the Front Door. Arthur can't even find out what is happening back home. All he knows is that Leaf isn't on earth any more. She's missing and so are hundreds of other people who were transferred from regular hospitals to a private institution run by a 'Doctor Friday'. From there they have been taken somewhere else in the Secondary Realms, for Lady Friday's own horrible purposes. Amid all this trouble, Arthur's mother is also missing, and he must weigh up an offer from Lady Friday that is either a cunning trap for the Rightful Heir or a golden opportunity he must seize -- before Superior Saturday or the Piper beats him to it.

About this title

About the Author

Garth Nix was born in 1963 and grew up in Canberra, Australia. After taking his degree in professional writing from the University of Canberra, he worked in a bookshop and then moved to Sydney. There he sank lower into the morass of the publishing industry, steadily devolving from sales rep through publicist until in 1991 he became a senior editor with a major multinational publisher. After a period travelling in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Asia in 1993, he left publishing to work as a marketing communications consultant . In 1999 he was lured back to the publishing world to become a part-time literary agent. He now lives in Sydney, a five-minute walk from Coogee Beach, with his wife, Anna, and lots of books.

From School Library Journal

Grade 6–9—Arthur Penhaligon is having a bad week. Of course he is now "Lord Arthur, Rightful Heir to the Architect, Commander of the Army of the Architect, and a whole lot of other stuff" since defeating Sir Thursday, but his job certainly isn't any easier. Lady Friday has supposedly abandoned her claim to the Middle House, and she has challenged Arthur, the Piper, and Superior Saturday to find the Fifth Key and gain control of the Middle. Meanwhile, Arthur's friend Leaf has been captured by Lady Friday and is being used to lure Arthur into her trap. She has become obsessed with "Experiencing" mortal memories and is bent on taking as many humans as she can. As with other books in the series, this story is replete with characters that are good, bad, and ambiguous. The plot is complex, and readers need to read the four previous books to have any sense of what is going on in this one. As always, Nix's writing is witty and the plays on words are entertaining. The author gives just enough new information to keep the series' fans coming back for more, but he doesn't answer many questions.—Cheri Dobbs, Detroit Country Day Middle School, Beverly Hills, MI
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Edition details

• Publisher: HarperCollins Children's Books
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0007175094
• ISBN 13: 9780007175093
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384