IRA/CBC Teachers' Choice

Junior Library Guild Selection

ALA Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers

ALA Best Fiction for Young Adults

American Bookseller Pick of the Lists

ALA Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults

IRA/CBC Young Adults’ Choice

Just fourteen, Rick Walder is alone, on the run, and desperate. Stowing away in the back of a truck, he suddenly finds himself at a dead end, out in the middle of nowhere. The Maze. In this surreal landscape of stark redrock spires and deep sandstone canyons, Rick stumbles into the remote camp of Lon Perigrino, a bird biologist who is releasing fledgling California condors back into the wild. Intrigued by the endangered condors and the strange bearded man dedicated to saving them, Rick decides to stay on. When two men with a vicious dog drive up in a battered old Humvee, Rick discovers that Lon and his birds are in grave danger.

Will he be able to save them?

In a heart-stopping adventure infused with the spirit of the Icarus myth and a boy's dreams of flight, Will Hobbs brings readers a unique tale of identity, personal growth, and friendship.