THE ARCTIC CODE

A sudden ice age has near-future humanity on the ropes, but neither glaciers nor a vast conspiracy to hide their cause stops a preteen from heading into the Arctic in search of her missing mother.

Galvanized by a set of secret files sent just before her geologist mom disappears, Eleanor sets out from frigid Phoenix for a research lab in nearly uninhabitable Alaska. She finds that both the area and the search have been taken over by climatologist Aaron Skinner, smooth-talking CEO of gigantic Global Energy Trust. Eleanor’s suspicions that G.E.T. is up to no good are confirmed after she is (wait for it) rescued by a Paleolithic hunter with weird eyes who takes her to a huge ice cavern. There, an ancient alien machine called a Concentrator is sucking “telluric current” from Earth’s ley lines and beaming it to a previously unknown rogue planet that has knocked Earth out of its orbit. Taking all of this in stride more easily than readers, particularly thinking ones, are likely to, Eleanor marshals her forces, at least temporarily deals with the current bad guys and flies off to find other Concentrators in future episodes before G.E.T. can.

A confused jumble of fantasy and science-fictional elements make a notably unsteady foundation for Kirby’s newest series.