The Edge by Roland Smith

From Goodreads,

"Fifteen-year-old Peak Marcello hasn’t climbed since intentionally failing to reach the summit of Mount Everest. He’s been enjoying life at sea level, spending his time with the Two Peas—his younger twin sisters—and being a regular, law-abiding teenager. But then his old climbing buddies, JR, Will, and Jack, show up with an offer Peak may not be able to refuse: the International Peace Ascent. The billionaire Sebastian Plank is recruiting a global team of young climbers to make an inspiring, world-uniting documentary. Peak’s been chosen as the U.S. representative. A part of him wants to stay home and out of the spotlight. But another part is itching to get back out there. In the end, the itch has got to be scratched, and Peak, along with his mom, is helicoptered in to a remote base camp in the Hindu Kush Mountains.

But the trip quickly goes from good time to nightmare. Attacked by an unknown and unseen enemy, some of the climbers are kidnapped—including Peak’s mom.

Peak has no choice but to go after them."

Goodreads - The Edge

This book is a sequel to the book Peak.  In this book Peak has returned home and is trying to return to a normal life by spending lots of time with his sisters the Peas.  Peak returns to his mother's shop and finds the film crew who followed him on Everest.  He talks with them and quickly realizes he has been recruited to be a part of a Peace Summit.  He is very reluctant to join, but eventually decides to.  His mom tags along and they embark on a journey to Afghanistan.  Peak finds that Zopa is the climb master and that Zopa has an off feeling about the entire trip.  Things go awry and Peak and his friends must fight to survive the Peace Summit.

After I read Peak, I got excited after finding there was a second book.  I promptly found the book on Amazon and had it shipped as soon as possible.  I really expected this book to be about Peak making a second attempt at Everest.  It ended up that a Peace Summit is taking place and Peak has been recruited, along with his mother.  I really liked that this book forged more of a relationship between Peak and his mother, especially since Peak was with his father primarily in the first book.  We didn't see or hear a lot about Peak's mother, and it was good to have her truly incorporated into this book.  I really enjoyed that Peak and his mother went on this climb and encountered an enemy who was out to hurt them.  I felt like the enemy really created more of a bond between Peak and his mom.  I also loved the irony of the Peace Summit, but there was no peace on this climb.

A few parts of this book were very thrilling and exciting, but at others it was very dull.  I felt like this book lacked the pizazz that Peak did.  The book was very dull and boring at the beginning.  There was absolutely nothing exciting happening except for everyone meeting for the climb.  I found it hard to adjust from reading about snow capped mountains to reading about Peak climbing in the desert.  I felt like the most exciting part was when Peak and Ethan realized that people had been murdered.  The rest of this book was very dull and lacked any sort of enthusiasm.  I didn't feel like this sequel did the first book justice, and I wish that Peak had been a stand alone book.

I give this book 3 stars out of 5.  I would recommend this to anyone that has read the first book.  My brother in law is currently reading this book, so I'm excited to talk to him about his thoughts on the book.