Tangled Web

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

This sequel to Shelley Hrdlitschka’s Disconnected reunites twin
brothers Tanner Bolton and Alex Swanson, now almost 15, in yet another
adventure involving drug dealer Hap. Six months after Disconnected’s
action, Tanner travels from Edmonton to Vancouver to participate in a
hockey camp and stay with Alex. During the period the brothers are
together, each begins a quest that involves the other, and, although the
brothers’ activities are seemingly separate, they become entangled.
Tanner’s ostensibly benign activity concerns his attempting to find
their birth mother. Alex, however, becomes immersed in something much
more sinister: after receiving threatening mail, he learns that Hap,
while awaiting trial, has been released on bail. With Maureen, the chief
prosecution witness, having disappeared, the two brothers are now the
principal threat to Hap’s freedom. Deciding not to be a passive
victim, Alex intends to allow himself to be kidnapped, and then, in a
reversal of the events of Disconnected, he will use the brothers’
mind-imaging abilities to effect his rescue and Hap’s capture.
However, it is Tanner who, while supposedly meeting his birth mother, is
kidnapped instead and again requires rescuing.

As in Disconnected, Hrdlitschka uses both boys’ points of view in
unfolding the plot. Tangled Web contains sufficient antecedent action
that readers need not have first read Disconnected. An acceptable
juvenile thriller, Tangled Web is somewhat overwritten and at times
strains credibility, especially regarding Hap’s ability to penetrate
the police force and a university research project. Recommended.