Content Warning: This section of the novel discusses statutory rape, child abuse, and child sexual abuse.

In an excerpt from Jack’s first book, The House on Clock Island, Astrid and Max’s mother searches for them on Clock Island, terrified that she has lost them. Astrid and Max debate whether to tell her that they’re with the Mastermind. Astrid fears their mother finding them because they will have to explain that they ran away because they miss their father. The children’s parents agreed that the father would move to a new town for work while the children would stay with their mother and continue to attend their current school. Astrid and Max acknowledge that if their parents realize how unhappy they are, the whole family will likely move to the town where the father works. Astrid is scared of moving to a new place and leaving everything she knows behind, but she understands that living without their father is the scariest thing of all. Astrid gathers her brother and her courage and shouts for her mother.

A violent storm approaches the island as the contestants have a heart-to-heart talk about their less-than-ideal circumstances. Knowing one another’s issues, all three contestants wish each other well in the final games.