Story Thieves, Book 1

Most of the violence is fantasy-world cartoonish rather than real-world scary. Protagonists face attacks from magic spells, death rays, killer robots, and zombies, among other hazards, and one is called upon to have his heart removed. A character has a chip surgically implanted in his neck by robots (but it seems to have no ill effects), and another has been so injured in past conflicts that half her body is robotic. Bethany is traumatized by the loss of her father, who disappeared into a book early in her childhood.

Sparks of romantic interest between boy and girl characters, but it doesn't go beyond friendliness and hand-holding when they're jumping into worlds.

Parents need to know that just about everything about Story Thieves, the series opener from Half Upon a Time author James Riley, has probably been done better elsewhere, from robots, zombies, and magical weapons to pondering such big issues as free will, fiction vs. reality, and the clash between science and imagination. That doesn't mean this wild mash-up won't find an appreciative audience, especially among kids who spend a lot of time in virtual worlds (especially video games), where the pacing is frenetic, just about anything can happen, and making sense is optional. There's violence aplenty, from impending planetary doom to weird robotic surgeries, but it's usually brief and almost always cartoonish. The young (they're studying fractions in school) protagonists often are pretty one-note, but they learn a few things about bravery, looking out for one another, dealing with unexpected developments, and averting cosmic disaster. Book 2 in the series, The Stolen Chapters, was released J. 19, 2016.