Endgame: The Calling

Endgame combines the urgency of The Hunger Games with the global scale of The Amazing Race for a sleek, dangerous adventure that pits teenage Players against each other in a battle to the death, with the world as their arena. From the first chapter, the stakes couldn’t be higher: twelve ancestral Lines represent Earth’s population, and each Line is, in turn, represented by one Player who must win Endgame to save his or her Line from extinction. Brisk, effective writing moves the plot forward at high speed, even as chapters alternate among an intriguing cast of multicultural characters. Every Player brings a different mindset and set of skills to the Game (“While other Players of Endgame have focused on their physical skills, Shari has honed her mind like a blade, meditation her whetstone.”). Readers will marvel at the Players’ various expertise as they crack codes, catch arrows mid-flight, and engage in hand-to-hand combat. Complicated puzzles direct the Players to ancient wonders of the world. Evocatively detailed descriptions include China’s Terracotta Army, where “over 8,000 life-sized warrior statues guard the remains of the first emperor of China,” and Turkey’s Gobekli Tepe, a Neolithic stone structure that, according to one character, has “turned a lot of assumptions on their ear. Like when humans started making cities [and] when they started worshipping in temples.” Endgame isn’t just a competition for its Players. It’s also a competition for its readers. Hidden throughout the book, companion Web sites, and a mobile app are clues that lead to a key, “hidden somewhere on Earth,” that unlocks a chest of gold worth $500,000.

In this bloated globe-trotting adventure linked to an online treasure hunt, twelve teenagers compete (unto death) to find three Keys. The "why" is mostly irrelevant, tied to a convoluted mythology to which the players unquestioningly subscribe. Puzzle hounds may enjoy pursuing the online clues, but the flat characters and jumpy plot ensure that anyone in it for the story should look elsewhere.