The Patterson name will attract readers but his fans may be disappointed that this tale never takes flight. Loose ends abound but presumably the sequel, scheduled for 2006, will reveal the identity of the evil 'whitecoats' and their motives as well as who owns the Voice speaking inside Max's head. The point of view shifts jerkily before settling into Max's first-person narration, which is self-deprecating but never sounds like a real teen's voice, and the novel is strewn with mutations of nouns-turned-adjectives ('tunnel-visiony,' 'antisepticky,' even 'Robin Hoodsy'). The often violent hunt-and-chase plot resembles that of a Saturday morning superhero cartoon. Well, nothing except to aid a stranger, bond with some real birds, eat lunch and take lengthy naps. When the School's henchmen-'Erasers,' 'half-men, half-wolves' (one of whom is their rescuer Jeb's seven-year-old son)-kidnap six-year-old Angel, the youngest member of 'the flock,' Max and company will stop at nothing to rescue her. YOUR FAITHFUL COMPANIONS: Max, Fang, Iggy, Nudge, the Gasman and Angel. Max (aka Maximum Ride), the 14-year-old girl from both of the aforementioned novels, leads a band of mutant orphans hiding from the sinister scientists at 'the School,' who grafted avian DNA onto their genes, giving them wings (plot points established in When the Wind Blows , and places them in an overblown, nearly incomprehensible story pitched at young adults. Thriller writer Patterson takes characters that first appeared in his adult novels When the Wind Blows

Maximum ride the angel experiment