It’s definitely the middle book of a trilogy, and one you wouldn’t really want to purchase without having the rest of the series available, too. But I give it points for standing on its own well enough that if a student randomly picks this one up without having read book #1 (which I hadn’t), they can enjoy this adventure anyway. Enough information is explained along the way so you get the gist of what has gone on before, but this one has it’s own beginning-middle-end. Readers who enjoy it would be drawn into seeking out the other books, but it wouldn’t hurt too much that they read them out of order.It’s the story of Egg (short for Egbert), and his friends traveling through lands where they don’t speak the languages in search of someone who can help them decipher a treasure map, while dodging others who are after their secrets. It’s got pirates and jungles and human sacrifice and slave traders and a bit of romance, too.