Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard

 Aveyard, V. (2015). Red queen. New York, NY: HarperCollins.

Mare Barrows lives in a divided world. Depending on the color of your blood, red or silver, you are given a place in society. If you are red-blooded you are treated like a slave and made to work like one too, and if you are silver-blooded you are considered royal and most likely have a special-power that sets you apart from the red-bloods (telekinesis, water control, superhuman strength, swiftness, and bend nature). Mare is a master thief and does so to help her family survive. When her best-friend, Kilorn, is told that he will be serving in the army she tries to help him escape, but to do so she needs to come up with a lot of money.  She resorts to pick-pocketing and ends up stealing from the kingdom's Prince Cal. He in turn does give her money, but to prevent her from being put in the army as well he has her taken to the castle to work. While there she finds out she has the power to conjure electricity from her body and is made to look as if she were in fact a silver-blood who was raised by the red-bloods, but that isn't so. She is a special kind of person, and war ensues as the red and silver-bloods try to over-power the other. As the feelings of love come in, Mare has to find a way to overthrow the silver-bloods before they decimate everything she has ever known and loved. In the end, she and Cal and a few special-blooded people seek a way to find Maven, Cal's half brother, who is planning to overtake the reign and kill all who get in his way.

Mare's story has a lot of adventure and deceit in it that can make students from middle school and above addicted to finding out the outcome of this saga. The themes that are included are of course society, social-class, slavery, friendships, and monarchies. Teachers will be able to use this novel in comparison to multiple events that have taken place in history and can answer the ultimate questions: does history repeat itself?

I rate this book a 5 out of 5 stars!

Jackaby by William Ritter

 Ritter, W. (2014). Jackaby. New York, NY: Scholastic.

Abigail Rock has just set sail for New Fiddleham and is looking for a job and a place to stay. What she finds though, is something unimaginable: R.F. Jackaby. He is a private investigator in search of a new assistant, but he is a little out of the ordinary. He claims to be able to see things which others cannot, and has become a nuisance to the police force, that is all except detective Charlie Cane. While Jackaby sees things that lead him to believe they have a supernatural serial killer, this all because of a banshee he sees at the scene of the recent crime, they are still escorted out and hope to find the next victim before the killer does. They are constantly on the search, but arrive a little to late to each one and cannot save them, and the commissioner, Commissioner Swift, finally sees that Jackaby may be the only hope left for the case. When it comes time to confront the killer, with a large police force backing them, Charlie turns into a beast and is thought to be the killer until Abigail runs into the Commissioner who in turn also morphs and shows that he is actually a goblin. He injures both Charlie and Abigail, but they are saved by Jackaby. Charlie is unfortunately not reinstated to their force, but is forced to assume a new position, so it leaves Abigail and Jackaby alone for whatever adventure comes next.

This book was filled with exciting twists and turns, both real and supernatural, and one cannot help but fall in love with what Ritter has included in the novel. I believe that students from middle school and up will enjoy this novel because of the thrill and suspense it leaves you in looking for the killer. Teachers can include this novel to discuss plot, inferencing, myths, and characterization.

I rate this book a 5 out of 5 stars!

 

Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith

 Smith, A. (2014). Grasshopper jungle: A history. New York, NY: Dutton Books.

Austin Szerba lives in an uneventful town named Ealing, Iowa; the only thing that is remotely entertaining there is an old mall that has been used by Austin and his friend Robby as a skate park.  Unfortunately, it isn't only occupied by Austin and Robby, but also by a few bullies who beat up Robby and leave some of his blood on the strip mall ground and some of their belongings on the mall roof. When Austin, Robby and Austin's girlfriend Shann go to reclaim their belongings they go into a store that has a lot of abandoned creatures in weird jars that once shattered begin to form into very dangerous, and horny, praying mantis. When Shann finds a secret message in her room, they all go to a bunker that protects humans unaffected by the outbreak. They find a few tapes regarding the outbreak, but are missing some, so Austin and Robby are sent to go and find them. Through the tapes they discover that they can stop the creatures through Robby's blood, since it was his blood from the mall that created the, but when they go onto extracting it and putting them in paint-balls they discover that it is too late for them, the praying mantis' have repopulated. They are stuck underground and only leave during winter months to search for resources. 

This novel is an extremely interesting sci-fi apocalyptic journey into the unknown. I believe that many students will enjoy the adventure they are thrown into in the hopes that Ealing can be saved. There are some themes that would need to be addressed in this novel such as the sexual desires felt by Austin, but this is something that can be shared with students in high school rather than middle school and under. 

I rate this book a 4 out of 5 stars!

Please Ignore Vera Dietz by Amy Sarig King

 King, A. S. (2010). Please ignore Vera Dietz. New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf.

Vera Dietz has a lot going on in her life right now. Her ex-best-friend, Charlie, has just died in what people believe was a fire he started, her mother has been gone from her life since she was 12, she is a closet alcoholic, she and her dad have to work out their relationship together, and she keeps seeing Charlie's ghost who asks her to clear his name on the fire incident. It is through flashbacks that we see how Vera's friendship with Charlie started strong, built on strength they gave each other through helping each other get through their family issues, and ended when Charlie began hanging out and dating one of the girls from "the wrong-crowd." Jenny, Charlie's girlfriend, begins to convince Charlie that Vera is bad and he starts to change. She even convinces him to have sex on video so that they can sell it to a perverted guy, one that Charlie has already sold used underwear to, for money. When he doesn't want to do it anymore, Jenny threatens to set the pet store on fire and kill him. He goes to Vera for help, but she refuses to help him at first, but when she goes to the pet store all she see is Jenny and no Charlie, so she figures he didn't show up. In the end, Vera decides that she must confess what ultimately killed Charlie, and who is at fault for the fire. Vera and her father reconcile and look forward to taking some time off for themselves. 

Please Ignore Vera Dietz is filled with page-turning drama and suspense. Although it does discuss serious topics such as the relationship between Charlie and the perverted man, sex and money, verbal abuse, domestic violence, and alcoholism, it is still a text that can serve great purpose for young adults. It also shows the positivity of telling the truth to save those you care about and how building a relationship on honesty and trust can make your life better. 

I rate this book a 5 out of 5 stars!

The Knife of Never Letting Go

 Ness, P. (2008). The knife of never letting go. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press.

Todd Hewitt isn't what you would call a "normal" teen; he lives in a town called Prentisstown and all the citizens here are male. They can all hear each others thoughts and this is what is called "noise." Everything seems normal until Todd finds himself hearing silence. When he goes home, his parents tell him that he has to leave before the others come looking for him. As he leaves he comes across a female named Viola, an alien who has crashed her spaceship, and she is the cause for the silence he hears. They need to escape from Prentisstown before the army come and claim them, but one of their pursuers will stop at nothing to get them first: Aaron, the towns larger-than-life preacher. Todd and Viola go from town to town in search of peace for themselves, and they find help along the way, but they cannot escape from Aaron who always seems to find them and refuses to die despite being maimed by an alligator. It isn't until the end that we see Aaron die because Viola stabbed him, and all looks well until they come across Mayor Prentiss' son who then shoots Viola in the stomach. As they are escaping Prentiss Jr. and head to Haven, another town, they are met with emptiness and Mayor Prentiss who is starting a New World Order. Who knows what this new town has in store for them because it was under Mayor Prentiss' regime that Prentisstown's residents were outcast men who had killed women and another alien race.

This novel is filled with unique twists and turns within the plot. Patrick Ness was able to create a world that would entice so many young adults to read and find it intriguing. The main themes for this novel would be coming-of-age, manipulation, gender, choice, and guilt. With these themes we would be able to bridge this novel with others that are similar in some aspects such as the Unwind series by Neal Schusterman.

I rate this book a 4 out of 5 stars!