Super Max and the Mystery of Thornwood's Revenge by Susan Vaught

"Then I fired up my chair, whizzed to the back door, opened it, and blasted down the house's back ramp."  page 170

Age Range: 8 - 12 years
Grade Level: 3 - 7
Lexile Measure: 820 (Grade 5.5)
Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books (August 29, 2017)
Rating: 3 out of 4

Summary:
It is going to take more than a knack for electronics and a supercharged wheelchair for twelve-year-old Max to investigate a haunted mansion.

Super Max is a middle school girl who loves tinkering, technology, and figuring out ways to make her motorized wheelchair  extra powerful.  She was in a car accident when she was four years old and became paralyzed. Her single mother gave guardianship over to her grandfather who is the town Police Chief and Max lives with him. Her mother lives in California.  The story starts with a social media hacking that spreads throughout the town's computers. The hacker seems to be targeting Max's grandfather and so she begins her own investigation using friends in town who have access to computer expertise and the suspicious happenings at the haunted mansion. The mystery was not easy to figure out and there was plenty of action and spookiness to be a very good story.  

The Max character is very headstrong and independent.  You learn what it is like for a person to live with a wheelchair everyday.  The author really wanted this aspect of Max to be part of the story which I thought was a great way to understand handicap issues.  The characters were very interesting too.  I loved Max's grandfather and kept thinking of who would make a great character for him in the movies.  I pictured Gerald McRaney. (Major Dad).  Lavender, Max's best friend, Lavender's mother, the town mayor, and others were all well developed characters.  

I rated this book a 3 out of 4 because sometimes I just had a difficult time keeping up with what was happening and I would have to reread. Sometimes I didn't understand the references to mechanics or computers. Sometimes it was because if you weren't reading closely, you would miss a detail that was important to the continuation of the story. Was it the writing style or my reading style, I couldn't say but it was a book where the flow wasn't easy for me.  However, I hope this book is a series because I think it would be great to see how the author develops the story and continues with the characters.