Ruby Redfort, Pick Your Poison or Pick Your Poison is the fifth book in the Ruby Redfort series. It was originally published in hardback and eBook format on 19th November 2015, and a softback edition followed on 5th May 2016.[1]
Summary[]
"Meet Ruby Redfort: every smart kid’s smart kid. The fifth book in the nail-biting series, created by award-winning author Lauren Child.
Ruby Redfort: undercover agent, code-cracker and thirteen-year-old genius – you can count on her when you’re between a rock and a hard place.
There’s a lot to lose sleep over in Twinford: there’s the snakes and the bivalves, but they aren’t half as poisonous as the rumours. With so many twists and turns, it’s hard to know who to trust, particularly when no one trusts you. Will Ruby make it out in one piece? Well, happy endings are for fairy tales, bozo."[2]
Plot[]
Prologues[]
A nine-year old Ruby is on her way to her grandmother's house when a tornado strikes. She runs to a pile of rocks, where she hides from the tornado. A snake bites Ruby; she draws it and notes the colours down before making her way to the road. A farmer picks her up and takes her to hospital, where the doctors give her the antivenom. From that day, Ruby resolved to know the pattern of every snake's skin.
A ten-year-old Ruby accompanies her father to the Olivarian Society offices, where Brant Redfort takes the olive taste test to join the society. Ruby takes the test herself and improves his test answers. Brant is heartily accepted into the club.
Main Plot[]
Ruby is on her way to Penny Books, feeling like a quiet day, when she spots Del Lasco and Vapona Begwell having an argument. Ruby grabs Del and runs with her into an alley, where they climb into a dumpster to hide from Vapona and her gang.
Ruby and Clancy meet at the tree on Amster to talk about the Explorer Awards and the snakes which are one of the contenders for the award. Ruby goes home and finds out that Sabina has lost her snake earrings. She thinks about her past Spectrum cases. She makes a list of loose ends: the jade, the indigo, the cyan and the key; but she can't find a link.
Ruby goes to Spectrum through the new entrance in the Dime a Dozen. She is interviewed by Agent Delaware from Spectrum 1. Ruby explains about the events with Claude, Lorelei and the 8 Key. However, she feels like she is under suspicion for being the Spectrum mole. Ruby is sent to the psychiatrist, who gives her a book about pausing to think in unsettling situations.
Ruby meets with her friends to discuss the Halloween costumes, and falls asleep at the table. Del writes "Redfort wake up and smell the banana milk" on her arm in a permanent pen. Later, her and Clancy talk about Ruby's meeting with Agent Delaware, and Clancy says she is taking it too personally.
The next day, Ruby attends a mathlympics meet. The last question, a tiebreaker between her and Dakota Lyme, is about a tesseract. Ruby correctly answers it and wins, making Dakota Lyme very angry. The following day, Ruby and her friends see a Taste Twister ad, and wonder what a "Taste Twister" is, as the ad doesn't say. Del comes to Ruby's house, and they sit on the roof. Ruby's comic blows into Mr Parker's garden, and Ruby goes to get it. In doing so, she sees snakes under the house, and Mr Parker's dog, unconscious. She calls the emergency vet, but Mr Parker is still annoyed that she trespassed on his yard. Ruby loses her cool and insults Mr Parker.
Ruby's parents have found out about the dumpster incident, and they are annoyed, but when Sabina discovers Ruby saved Mr Parker's dog from the snakes, she stops being mad.
Meanwhile, in prison, Boyd Marshall has received parts of a stonecutting tool hidden inside muffins, and escapes by digging a tunnel. There is a briefing at Spectrum about it, but they say he is not a threat to Spectrum or its agents.
After school the next day, Del runs into Vapona and a fight breaks out, which Ruby tries to stop. The cops arrive and take Ruby home, as she is the only one still there; the others have all run off. Ruby's parents are mad at her and ban her from going to the Explorer Awards. They also make her agree to babysit Archie Lemon regularly.
The next evening, Ruby watches the Explorer Awards on TV with Mrs Digby. There is a huge storm and the power gets cut. Ruby's parents return from the Explorer Awards, but Sabina is very ill. They call an ambulance and she is taken to hospital. While reading a book about poisons, Ruby realises that her mother could have been poisoned by her dress, and thinks it was methanol poisoning, as it fits the symptoms. The dress has disappeared from the hospital, but Ruby remembers the belt, and takes it in to Spectrum for testing. SJ finds the belt to contain methanol.
Ruby realises that someone was trying to poison Amarjargel Oidov, not her mother; they were wearing the same dress. She warns Spectrum, who find Amarjargel Oidov. She was poisoned by a wolfsbane specimen, given to her by Baby Face Marshall, but she is still alive. Hitch teaches Ruby aikido - a way to defeat her enemies using harmony.
The next day, Ruby sees a man in a red hat staring at the Taste Twisters billboard, so she follows him. He buys a bottle, sips it, then leaves it on a wall. Ruby picks it up and takes it in to Spectrum to test if it is poisoned - it isn't. There is an odd shape on the bottle, like a mandala - Ruby doesn't know what it is.
Ruby has a funny feeling about Blacker, as he supposedly arrived in HQ in the middle of a rainstorm completely dry, but a similar incident with Elliot puts her mind at rest. They go to Back-Spin, a table tennis cafe, where a new girl Sal is working the tills. Ruby thinks she is a phony.
Ruby is in the park babysitting Archie Lemon when she sees the man in the red hat again. She follows him to the music school, where he finds a Taste Twister bottle, and goes to meet a "goon for hire" in the concert theatre of the music school. He tells the man to track down Boyd Marshall and eliminate him. After he leaves, the goon's friend appears. Ruby is hiding in the theatre but Archie wakes up and the two men chase her around the auditorium. The chase ends in Ruby knocking them out. She takes the bottle back to HQ, and they try to analyse the flavours to break the code, but they don't have any ideas.
Ruby is called to the principal's office about the fight, but she doesn't tell him anything. Del thinks Ruby told on her, but luckily her mom takes her side when she gets a call from Principal Levine. Ruby tells her she didn't tell on her. It turns out an anonymous person phoned the principal with the information.
Ruby works out the Taste Twister code - the "mandala" is a map. She meets Hitch in Little Italy, and sees Sal go into an expensive apartment block. Hitch takes Ruby to a meeting with LB, where they talk about the events at the music school. LB expresses doubt about the existence of the Australian. Ruby leaves the office and takes Blacker a donut in his office, as everyone else is in a meeting. She overhears him talking about a loose cannon and mentioning her name. She conceals part of the code from him, as she thinks he doesn't trust her. She thinks Blacker thinks she is the mole, and that he is warning people about her.
She goes to a dojo to learn Yellow Wind-Dragon kung fu. The next day, she goes to Spectrum, acting normal, and breaks into the file safe, where she finds instructions from Blacker for everyone to not reveal information to her. Ruby goes to the next location of the Taste Twisters and retrieves the bottle, whose code points to the Movie Museum.
At school, Vapona's project has been found in Del's locker. Del is suspended from school, and grounded, but then a video surfaces of Ruby putting it there. Mrs Bexenheath calls Del’s mother telling her that Principal Levine wants to have a word with her regarding the video. Clancy doesn't believe it was Ruby.
Ruby gets the next Taste Twister bottle from the Movie Museum. Hitch gives Ruby a wristband that sprays solidifying vapour. Ruby goes out for a walk and realises one of Blacker's associates is following her. She goes to Spectrum and confronts Blacker about it, but he walks out. Ruby goes to practise kung fu, but returns to Spectrum to talk to Blacker. LB and Agent Delaware tell Ruby that Lorelei von Leyden has escaped from jail, and has a grudge against Ruby. Ruby and Blacker work out where the last Taste Twister location is, but there is nothing there.
Meanwhile, Lorelei von Leyden meets with Baby Face Marshall. She makes it clear that he tried to kill Amarjargel Oidov. She says she wants to kill the Australian, who is looking to kill Baby Face, and asks him for snakes to do it.
Clancy realises it wasn't Ruby in the video and meets Del at Back-Spin to try and tell her, but she doesn't believe him. He calls Ruby to tell her to meet him at the Donut. Some guys arrive and start hassling Sal, who gets really angry. Clancy realises she is actually Lorelei von Leyden in disguise.
Clancy tells Ruby his suspicion, and she realises it must be true. They go to "Sal's" apartment and Ruby sends a message to Hitch and Blacker to tell them she has located Lorelei. Ruby goes in to the apartment and Lorelei grabs her ankle. Lorelei admits she was the one messing with Ruby's friends "cause it's, like, super fun".
Clancy is waiting outside and finds the fly barrette in his pocket. Hitch has not got Ruby's message, so Clancy tells him his location and Hitch says they are on their way. He goes into the apartment but gets grabbed by Baby Face Marshall, who has been sleeping in the other room.
Ruby and Lorelei fight; Lorelei pins Ruby to the floor but Ruby uses her vapour band to trap her. Baby Face Marshall comes in and shows them Clancy, who has been bitten by a snake. He offers Ruby the antivenom if she will release Lorelei. Ruby accepts, and Baby Face and Lorelei escape the apartment - as the Australian is coming towards the apartment. Ruby administers the antivenom to Clancy. Hitch arrives, and it turns out he didn't get the message from the watch, because Archie Lemon has been sucking on it and there is drool in it.
Ruby realises the last location in the Taste Twister code is underground - the Sacred Heart Cathedral crypt. She contacts Blacker, who tells her to come in to HQ, but then sends a message that says to meet him there. Ruby goes to the crypt, but the Count is there, not Blacker. The Count reveals that he created the Taste Twister code to lure her to him. He tells her that he was hired to kill her by his "employer", but does not want to any more; he needs her alive. He says there is a mole in Spectrum and that it is one of her colleagues. The Count asks Ruby how Bradley Baker died, and says that someone shot the plane down. He then picks up the apple lying on a tombstone and throws it. Ruby stoops to pick it up, but when she stands up he has gone.
Epilogues[]
Ruby tells LB, Agent Delaware, Agent Blacker and Hitch what happened in the crypt. They tell her that Baby Face Marshall has been killed. They state that they now know there is a double agent in Spectrum, and that they are feeding information to the Count.
The Halloween parade takes place, and Ruby and her friends dress as The Rigors of Mortis Square. Ruby has borrowed Archie Lemon to play the Baby Grim, and Quent provides his dog Dorothy to play Toadstool. A tornado hits West Twinford, but the pageant is unharmed. However, the tornado blew through Archie's room in the Lemons' house, so it was lucky he was at the pageant.
From the Twinford Mirror[]
The Twinford Mirror reports on Archie's lucky escape, and that Amarjargel Oidov has recovered. They report a snake bite epidemic and a story about a dog stopping his owner from going out in a tornado. Dakota Lyme is reported to have thrown objects at a fellow mathlympics competitor when he won, and the Mirror's new-look format is praised, although it looks exactly like the Echo.
Ruby does her last stint of community service by clearing the site of the Sacred Heart Cathedral. She gives a shopping cart that she finds there to Mrs Beesman.
Ruby opens the apple from the crypt and finds a piece of paper in it, with the letters LB written on it. She thinks back about the Count's last question, "who pulled the trigger?".
Things I Know and Things I Don't Know[]
Ruby writes that she knows the Australian is working for the Count, who is working for someone else. The Count has betrayed that someone. She writes that this someone has a grand plan and wants to kill her. She knows that Lorelei also wants to kill her, and that LB killed Bradley Baker.
Ruby writes that she doesn't know why to all of the above, and also where her mother's snake earrings are, which her mother lost.
Quotes
‘I regret that until I have some solid answers from you, I have no alternative but to send you home. As of now (he looked at his watch) you are suspended.’
‘You are totally not serious.”
“She went over to the counter where Sal was chatting to Danny Jupiter. Del would be annoyed to miss him, she had a thing about Danny Jupiter. Ruby couldn’t see it herself.”
Characters[]
Main Characters[]
Supporting Characters[]
- Del Lasco
- Sabina Redfort
- Brant Redfort
- LB
- Agent Delaware
- Mrs Digby
- Archie Lemon
- Baby Face Marshall
- Agent Blacker
Minor Characters[]
- Elliot Finch
- Bailey Roach
- Leo and Bruno
- The Man In The Red Hat
- Count von Viscount
- Vapona Begwell
- Gemma Melamare
- Dakota Lyme
- Mr Parker
- Amarjargel Oidov
- The Australian
- Jen Yu
| Previous volume: | Next volume: |
| Ruby Redfort, Feel the Fear | Ruby Redfort, Blink and You Die |