Fearless is a series of teen novels written by American author Francine Pascal, creator of the Sweet Valley High franchise. The first book in the series, Fearless, was published in 1999 through Simon Pulse and concluded in 2004 with the 36th entry, Gone. A spinoff series, Fearless FBI was launched in 2005. The first book in the primary series, Fearless, was named one of YALSA's "Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Adult Readers" for 2001.
The series takes place in the 1990s and focuses on Gaia Moore, who is a seventeen-year-old girl at the beginning of the series, and who is incapable of feeling fear. Fearless focuses predominantly on Gaia's interactions and relationships with the people around her, as well as her search for an explanation for her condition and her struggle to feel like a normal teenager. The series is told primarily in three story arcs, each of which has its own primary antagonist, and concludes with Gaia graduating from high school.
Backstory
Gaia has had past strife in her family as a result of a love triangle between Gaia's mother (Katia) and the twin siblings Tom and Oliver Moore. Katia ultimately rejected Oliver and he then became obsessed with her. Katia eventually married Tom, but on the night of the wedding Oliver pretended to be Tom and raped Katia. She eventually conceived Gaia with Tom, only for Oliver to believe that Gaia is his daughter. This is later revealed to be untrue, as Oliver had become sterile due to a life saving medical operation he received as a child, which also contributed to his unstable mental status.
Oliver spent many years evading the CIA but was eventually caught by Katia's father, a Russian terrorist named Yuri. Yuri contained Oliver, who eventually overtook Yuri's organization and became its leader, adopting the moniker of Loki. He would later try to connect with Gaia by visiting her under the guise of being her father Tom and teaching her martial arts. This confused Gaia, who eventually rejected Oliver. Oliver's actions were eventually detected by Tom and Oliver went into hiding once again. It was during this time that Gaia began to show a lack of fear, which was eventually confirmed by CIA testing that proclaimed her genetically unable to experience fear for herself.
Oliver did not re-emerge in Gaia's life until she was twelve, when he tried to assassinate Tom but instead killed Katia by accident. This spurred Tom to essentially abandon Gaia in hopes of sparing her from Oliver's attentions, which would embitter her towards her father and cause her to become emotionally withdrawn and antisocial. Gaia spent the remainder of her childhood in several abusive foster homes.
Story arcs
First story arc
The first story arc shows Oliver "Loki" Moore (the leader of a Russian terrorist organization), trying to regain Gaia's trust due to his mistaken belief that she is his daughter. He uses several extreme methods to get close to her and issues commands for his agents to track her movements, which continues throughout the entire series. This endangers not only Gaia, but the people around her, as she has recently begun her Junior year at a New York City high school. She makes several friends, including the paraplegic Ed Fargo and the college student Sam, whom Gaia has a crush on. Her crush is made complicated by the fact Sam is dating Gaia's rival and bitter school enemy: Heather.
Loki attempts to isolate Gaia by kidnapping or killing anyone close to her, which results in the kidnapping of Sam. Gaia manages to rescue Sam from Loki's operatives, but is unable to save her best friend Mary or her foster mother Ella from Loki's schemes; Mary is assassinated and Ella (a secret operative for Loki) sacrifices herself for Gaia. Heather breaks up with Sam and begins dating Ed, but dumps him shortly after her older sister Phoebe goes to rehab for anorexia nervosa. Gaia begins to date Sam, but the relationship is constantly strained by stress placed upon Sam from his college dormitory RA Josh (who works for Loki) and is later ended completely with Sam's apparent death. Things are further complicated when it is revealed that Josh is one of four clones created by Loki. One of the clones befriends and becomes infatuated with Heather, giving her a "fearless serum" created by Loki (based on research from Gaia's genome). Unexpectedly, this causes Heather to go blind.