When thirteen-year-old Ronan Truelove's seemingly ordinary mom snatches him from school, then sets off on a high speed car chase, Ronan is shocked. His quiet, nerdy dad has been kidnapped? And the kidnappers are after him, too? His mom, he quickly learns, is anything but ordinary. In fact, she's a member of an ancient order of knights, the Blood Guard, a sword-wielding secret society sworn to protect the Pure—thirty-six noble souls whose safety is crucial if the world as we know it is to survive. Now all those after-school activities—gymnastics, judo, survival training—she made him take, make sense. For suddenly Ronan is swept up in a sometimes funny, sometimes scary, but always thrilling adventure—dashing from one danger to the next, using his wits to escape the Bend Sinister, a posse of evil doers with strange powers. Falling in with two unlikely companions, Greta, a scrappy, strong-willed girl he's never much liked and Jack, a devil-may-care teenage pickpocket, Ronan is left with only his wits and his mom's last words of advice: Trust no one. That's a lot for an ordinary kid to deal with. But then again, maybe Ronan's not ordinary at all.
It consists of:
- The Blood Guard (2014)
- The Glass Gauntlet (2015)
- The Blazing Bridge (2017)
This series provides examples of:
- Action Mom: Ronan's mom is naturally this, being a member of the Blood Guard.
- Ancient Order of Protectors: The Blood Guard is an ancient order of knights dedicated to protecting the Pure.
- Angry Guard Dog: Ms. Glass, aka Agatha, has four of them named after the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, except the female dog, who is named Debra. Subverted as Jack befriends them fairly quickly.
- Archnemesis Dad: Ronan's dad is this to him, being the Head of the Bend Sinister, the Arch-Enemies of the Blood Guard.
- The Artful Dodger: Jack Dawkins was part of a small group of homeless pickpockets prior to joining the Blood Guard.
- Bad Samaritan: In the first book, Ronan and Greta stumble upon an elderly couple, Henry and Izzy, who offer them a ride to help find Greta's father. They turn out to be Bend Sinister agents sent to capture them.
- Better to Die than Be Killed: Head Truelove jumps off the Brooklyn Bridge to his death upon being cornered by the Blood Guard.
- Body Surf: Legion, one of the Hands of the Bend Sinister, has the ability to take over the bodies of Bend Sinister agents and even animals, as demonstrated with the Sustermann's cat, Grendel.
- Decapitated Army: The Bend acolytes at the end of the first book drop dead when Ronan kills Ms. Hand. Justified as they had donated their life force to her and she was the only thing keeping them animated.
- De-power: In a sense. Greta loses her purity after Ronan reveals that she's a Pure, meaning she no longer subconsciously influences others for the better and is now a regular person.
- Disability Superpower: Patch Steiner is blind, but can rob other people of their senses and see through his acolytes.
- Disney Villain Death: Legion and several of the Bend Sinister agents fall victim to this when Greta's Pure soul being expulsed blasts them off the rooftop. Head Truelove willingly falls to his death shortly afterwards.
- Doom as Test Prize: The "winner" of the Glass Gauntlet is to operate the titular device to transfer Agatha's soul into a new body, which will end up killing said user.
- Don't Make Me Destroy You: Head Truelove says this to Ronan near word-for-word when the latter tells Greta that she is a Pure.
- Embarrassing First Name: Ronan's first name is Evelyn, his mother having named him after her uncle. He can't stand it and prefers to go by his middle name.
- Even Evil Can Be Loved: Even despite his father being a member of an organization that plans to end the world and having tried to kill him several times, Ronan still cares about his father and is heartbroken when he commits suicide.
- Evil Old Folks: Evangeline Birk, the supreme head of the Bend Sinister, has been alive since at least the 1800s and definitely looks it.
- Fat Bastard: Patch Steiner, one of the Hands of the Bend Sinister and the primary antagonist in The Glass Gauntlet, is noted to be monstrously fat.
- Fiery Redhead: Red-haired Greta Sustermann is scrappy, strong-willed and boisterous.
- Foster Kid: Sammy's mother died years ago and he's been in several foster homes since, with his most recent foster parents turning out to be Bend Sinister agents.
- Good Thing You Can Heal: Jack Dawkins, whose Overseer abilities allow him to bounce back from virtually any injury, gets crushed, dismembered, and skewered throughout the series, among other things.
- Grand Theft Me: Agatha attempts to do this to Greta via the Damascene 'Scope, but abandons the plan after Greta purifies her soul.
- Heel–Face Turn: Agatha undergoes one in The Glass Gauntlet after having her evilness burned away by Greta's Pure soul via the Damascene 'Scope.
- Holier Than Thou: The Bend Sinister believe humanity is rotten with sin and thus needs to be cleansed from the Earth, while also thinking they'll be spared from the conflagration and be able to create a better world. Evangeline Birk even likens themselves to Noah and the ark.
- Horsemen of the Apocalypse: Ms. Glass' Doberman guard dogs are named after such, with the exception of Death, who is instead named Debra.
- Incorruptible Pure Pureness: The Pure are a subversion. As noted by Jack, they aren't saints or necessarily lead perfect lives, but they're intrinsically good people deep down that make everyone better just by existing. However, knowing that they're a Pure robs them of their inherent innocence and makes them lose the factor that makes them a Pure.
- I Regret Nothing: Head Truelove says as much to Ronan shortly before his death.Head Truelove: I can tell you this with all honesty, son: I have done nothing I am ashamed of.
- Keystone Army: Bend acolytes have their life force donated to the Hands and are dependent on them to remain animated. If a Hand is killed, the acolytes under their control drop dead.
- Lightning Gun: The Bend Sinister utilizes Tesla guns that shoot electricity.
- Losing Your Head: Ogabe gets decapitated by Bend Sinister acolytes in the first book. Since he's an Overseer and thus can't be killed, the acolytes take his head to prevent him from reattaching it to his body. The heroes manage to recover his head and tape it back onto his body.
- Mama Bear: Ronan's mother is rather protective of him and is willing to single-handedly take on Bend Sinister agents to ensure his safety.
- The Man Behind the Man: For the first two books, Head Truelove appears to be the leader of the Bend Sinister, with the Blood Guard focusing their efforts on capturing him. At the end of The Glass Gauntlet, however, it's revealed that Truelove himself takes order from the supreme leader of the Bend Sinister, Evangeline Birk.
- Marrying the Mark: Ronan's father, the Head of the Bend Sinister, married his mother to gain information on the Blood Guard and the Pure she was protecting.
- Mask of Power: The Perceptor, the Bend Sinister's equivalent to the Blood Guard's Verity Glass, which allows the wearer to detect the souls of a Pure.
- Master of Unlocking: Greta is a master lockpicker, having been taught by her father.
- Misanthrope Supreme: The Bend Sinister as a whole. They're convinced humanity is rotten with sin and seek to wipe out the thirty-six Pure to bring about the end times and rid the world of everyone except them.
- Mook Lieutenant: The Hands of the Bend Sinister, who carry out the organization's missions on the field and harness the life force of their acolytes to control them and wield various powers.
- My Greatest Failure: Jack considers his failure to protect Mathilde, the Pure soul under his watch, from being murdered by the Bend Sinister to be this.
- Nebulous Evil Organisation: The Bend Sinister, an ancient secret society that seeks to kill the thirty-six Pure and bring about the end of the world. This naturally brings them into conflict with the Blood Guard.
- Never Grew Up: Agatha became frozen in time due to a malfunction in the Damascene 'Scope when it was used on her, leaving her stuck in the body of a nine-year-old for nearly two centuries. She seeks to rectify this by swapping her soul into Greta's body.
- Not Just a Tournament: The Glass Gauntlet is set up by Ms. Glass to be a competition with the reward being a million dollars. In reality, it's a ploy by Ms. Glass, aka Agatha, to select an immoral child to operate the Glass Gauntlet and transfer her soul into another body, killing both the user and the destroying the vessel's previous soul.
- Offing the Offspring: Ronan's father, the Bend Sinister Head, orders one of his flunkies to dispose of Ronan when he rejects his offer to join their cause. Ronan survives, however.
- Papa Wolf: Greta's father joined the Blood Guard to help protect his daughter, who is one of the Pure, and made sure to teach her various life-saving skills to help her if she found herself in trouble.
- Parents in Distress:
- Ronan's mom and Greta's dad get captured by the Bend Sinister in The Blood Guard, forcing them to rescue them. Ronan also initially believes his father to be this, only to learn he's actually the Big Bad.
- Greta's mom gets kidnapped and held hostage by Head Truelove and his team in The Blazing Bridge.
- Parrying Bullets: Ronan's mother deflects gunfire from Bend Sinister agents with a cutlass.
- People Puppets: The Hands control Bend Sinister acolytes in this manner, the latter having given up their life force to their cause.
- Really 700 Years Old:
- Jack Dawkins looks like a teenager, but is actually 200 years old due to being an Overseer.
- Agatha looks nine, but is almost as old as Jack, having been stuck in the body of a child due to a malfunction with the Damascene 'Scope.
- The Day of Reckoning: The Bend Sinister refer to the end times as "The Reckoning".
- Save the Villain: Attempted by Ronan at the end of The Blazing Bridge. With his father dangling off the edge of the rooftop, Ronan attempts to pull him to safety with a cable, while also offering to use the Damascene 'Scope to burn away the evil in his father. However, the arrival of the rest of the Blood Guard causes his father to choose death instead.
- Soul Jar: The Conceptacle, which the Bend Sinister uses to entrap the extracted soul of Flavia.
- Soulless Shell: Many Bend Sinister acolytes sacrifice their life force to be channeled by the Hands, rendering them this.
- The Starscream: Legion, one of the Bend Sinister Hands, attempts to assume total control over the organization by killing Evangeline Birk and Head Truelove.
- Staying Alive: Overseers are immortal and can't be permanently killed unless someone else takes their place, whereupon the power is transferred to them.
- Sticky Fingers: Jack regularly pickpockets people, a leftover from his past as The Artful Dodger.
- Tournament Arc: The Glass Gauntlet revolves around the heroes entering a weird school and participating in the titular Gauntlet, a series of head-to-head competitions against other children.
- Villain in a White Suit: Patch Steiner, one of the Hands of the Bend Sinister, wears a glowing white suit.
- Wise Old Folk Façade: Bend Sinister agents Henry and Izzy put on the façade of a kindly old couple to lure Ronan and Greta into a trap.
- Would Hurt a Child: The Bend Sinister have no qualms attempting to torture or kill Ronan and Greta, who are both 13.
