Hate List by Jennifer Brown

Hate List by Jennifer Brown is about Valerie, a high school senior who has never quite fit in.  She has been the victim of the meanest school bullies since she started dressing and acting differently in middle school.  Valerie found a soul mate in Nick when he moved to town when they were both freshmen.  Together, they could weather the bullying.  Valerie started the Hate List in a red spiral notebook as a way to vent about being constantly picked on my the other students at school.  Each time something happened, she'd write down the bully's name.  Eventually, the list grew and grew, with names on the list multiple times.  Valerie always thought of the list as a way to get out her pain, but Nick took it to a different level.  On May 2nd of their junior year, Nick brought a gun to school and shot several of the students on the Hate List.  Valerie, once she realized what Nick was doing, threw herself in front of the last victim and took a bullet in her leg.  Immediately after accidentally shooting Valerie, Nick shot and killed himself.  Now, Valerie is left to deal with her injury, the loss of a boyfriend she truly loved, and the accusatory attitude of most of the people in her small town - including her own parents.  Bravely, Valerie returns to her high school in the fall, only to find that her friends have abandoned her.  She does, however, find a friend in the most unlikely place.  It takes her awhile to accept it, but Valerie eventually becomes friends with the girl she took the bullet for - the queen bee of the school, the one who was at the top of the Hate List due to her constant bullying and nastiness.  With the help of her psychologist Dr. Heiler, her art instructor Bea, and a new notebook filled with her sketches, Valerie learns a lot about herself and her classmates, and realizes that she has never quite looked at anything in her life in a way that allows her to "see" what is really there.

This was an awesome book.  I really liked the way it alternated between Valerie's current reality, her relationship with Nick, and the newspaper clippings.  After reading the Author's Note at the end, I realized that I read the story exactly the way she intended it - as Valerie's story, not the story of a school shooting.  It truly is the story of Valerie's survival and growth as she works through what happened.  I would recommend this book to mature readers who like the works of Sarah Dessen and Jodi Picoult.

Incarceron by Catherine Fisher

Incarceron by Catherine Fisher is about Finn, a prisoner in a unique prison, and Claudia, the prison warden's daughter.  In this future, the government has forced changelessness on the society, forcing them to live as people lived hundreds of years earlier.  One hundred years ago, Incarceron was conceived.  It was meant to be an experimental prison that most people in regular society thought was somewhat of a paradise for the prisoners.  This couldn't be further from reality.  Finn awoke in the prison when he was about 12 with only snippets of memories.  He immediately fell in with a band of thieving, murdering, partying gang and became oathbrothers with Keiro, a strong but somewhat untrustworthy boy.  When one of their raids produces a strange key, the boys set out to find escape with a healer/teacher, a Sapient, named Gildas.  Tagging along is a small slave girl who owes her life to Finn.  They are following the old stories of Sapphique, the only person (a Sapient) who has ever escaped the prison.

Claudia, while raiding her father's study with the help of her personal Sapient, Jared, finds a matching key.  There is a direct link between the keys and Finn and Claudia meet.  Claudia is promised to the younger half-brother of the former prince of their land.  The first born prince, and true heir died in an accident several years prior.  Claudia does not want to marry Caspar, but know she must follow "Protocol".  However, Claudia is also convinced that Giles, the rightful heir died under strange circumstances and is determined to learn the truth, without attracting the attention of her father and the evil queen.  Together, Finn and Claudia work to find escape from Incarceron, rid the world of the Protocol rules, and find out the truth about what happened to their kingdom.  Will they succeed?

I absolutely loved this book!  I cannot wait to read the sequel, Sapphique!  I loved the way the book alternated between Claudia's story and Finn's story, and how the two came together in the end.  I also liked the idea that the prison was its own living entity and completely in charge of the prisoners and completely unaware of what happened on the outside.  I would recommend this book to anyone who likes a good science fiction, fantasy or adventure novel.

The Crowfield Curse by Pat Walsh

The Crowfield Curse by Pat Walsh is set at the Crowfield Abbey in 1347.  Will is an orphan who has taken refuge at the abbey in exchange for working in the kitchen for the monks.  While gathering firewood one afternoon, Will comes across a very small, injured creature in an animal trap.  He is a hob, and Will has never seen anything like him.  Will decides to take him back to the abbey in hopes that one of the monks will be able to heal him.  Will must be careful, though, because he knows most of the monks would not approve of such a mysterious creature.  Through his healing, Will becomes friends with the hob, whom he calls Brother Walter, and learns bits and pieces of a secret the monks in at Crowfield have worked very hard to conceal for more than 100 years.  One winter Prior Ardo, the monk in charge while Abbott Simon's health is dwindling, allows two strange and unexpected guests to lodge at the abbey.  Will knows they are not human, but can't quite figure out what they are doing at the abbey.  That is, until Will learns a little too much about the secret the monks are so desperate to keep and finds out about the Crowfield Curse.

This was an awesome book!  I absolutely loved it!!  It kept me wanting to come back for more and more - I had a hard time putting it down.  I really liked the characters of Will and Brother Walter.  I especially liked the fantasy elements of the story and how most of the monks were so sheltered from that side of the world, despite being entrenched in it.  I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys fantasy.

Illegal by Bettina Restrepo

Illegal by Bettina Restrepo is about Nora, a 14 year old growing up on her family orchard in Cedula, Mexico. Three years ago, Nora's father left for Texas, hoping to earn money to keep the orchard going, leaving Nora with her mother and grandmother. Every day since then, Nora has longed for her father's return. Her weekly trip to the bank to receive her fathers' telegrams and money turns sour one day when nothing arrives. After a fight about what to do, Nora and her mother use their savings (meant to pay their taxes) to purchase bus tickets to the border and to pay a coyote, someone who helps people get across the U.S. border illegally. Their 10 hour trip aboard a mango truck was miserable, but they made it alive. Once in Houston, Nora takes charge. She finds them both an apartment and jobs, all the while asking around about her father. As Nora's 15th birthday approaches, she begins to suspect that her special quinceanera may not be as special as she always hoped it would be, especially since in seems less and less likely that they'll ever find her father.

This was a great book! It reminded me a little of La Linea by Ann Jaramillo. Both show how desperate people can be to take care of their families and how important family truly is. They also show the dangers in crossing the border illegally and the lengths people will go to get across.

Sources of Light by Margaret McMullan

Sources of Light by Margaret McMullan takes place in Mississippi during the early 1960s. Sam and her mother move to Jackson to be near Sam's paternal grandparents after her father is killed in the Vietnam War. Sam's mother is an art history professor at a college, while Sam attends 9th grade at a Jackson high school. Things begin to heat up in Jackson as the fight for black rights begins to unfold. Sam finds herself right in the middle of the fight when her mother speaks at a college for all black students. Suddenly, they are being watched and harassed by the Citizen's Council, which was described as the KKK without the sheets. Sam's mother's new "friend", Perry is a photographer who is committed to capturing Mississippi life on film. He teaches the art to Sam, even giving her one of his cameras. As things turn more and more violent, Sam finds herself even more in the mix when she finds out that the boy she's been seeing is somehow involved with the Citizen's Council and may have even played a part in an unspeakable crime. Through the lens of the camera, Sam begins to see things differently. She learns a lot about right and wrong, love and hate, black and white.

This was an incredible book! I especially appreciated the author's note at the end, describing her own feelings about growing up in Mississippi. I've read other books set during this time period (The Watson's Go to Birmingham, 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis, Fire From the Rock by Sharon Draper, and Mississippi Trial, 1955 by Chris Crowe) but this book takes on the perspective of a white teenage girl - completely different from the other books. I really liked the way the novel unfolded and the way Sam changed and grew throughout the story.

Accomplice by Eireann Corrigan

Accomplice by Eireann Corrigan is about best friends, Finn and Chloe. Both girls are looking ahead to their future: college. Unfortunately, despite their good grades, extracurricular activities, and positive attitudes, the girls are afraid they don't have anything to write their application essays about that will make them stand out amongst the other applicants. So, they hatch a plan to get them noticed. They will fake Chloe's disappearance. While Chloe hides out in Finn's grandmother's vacant house, the rest of their small town begins a manhunt to track down her kidnapper. This leaves Finn to deal with all of the police and news crews who show up to help. Throughout the entire ordeal, Finn nearly cracks. She finds some solace in Dean, the boy who had recently become Chloe's boyfriend and is now the prime suspect in her disappearance. Finn visits Chloe in secret when she gets an opportunity, and is convinced they need to call off the plan. As things get more and more heated in town and their plan begins to change, Finn can't seem to get past the need to come clean, while Chloe remains resolved to see it through. In the end, Finn learns some things about Chloe and her plan that she never would have suspected and she begins to wonder how solid their friendship was in the first place.

This was a really interesting book. Every guess I had about what would happen next was wrong! It kept me reading just so I could find out how everything was resolved. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes a good suspense novel or mystery - this ISN'T a mystery, but I think mystery lovers will like it!