Thursday, October 10, 2013

The Thursday Three: October is Mystery Month--Young Adult

1.  Jasper Jones.  Secrets, secrets, and more secrets.  This book takes place in a small Australian town and follows the aftermath of the death of a young teenage girl.  The people in this story live in a cloud of suspicion, speculation, prejudice and fear.  Over the course of the summer the main characters are forced to grow up too quickly, each plagued by secrets and mysteries too big for them to deal with.  The characters are so fabulously written.  I couldn't get enough of them.  The dialogue is fantastic.  This Michael L. Printz honor book is a great read.

2. Beautiful Lies. This book has so many twists and turns I couldn't help but be intrigued.  You've got two identical twins, one gets kidnapped and the other will stop at nothing to find her.  The whole twin connection is used/exploited in this book and at times I wasn't sure how I really felt about it.  Overall, I enjoyed the thrill of this book, the never-ending plot twists that always kept me guessing.  I can't say much about the plot without giving away spoilers, so if I have peaked your interest at all, give it a try.

3. The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer.  I like this book because it constantly had me double guessing what I thought I knew.  As a reader you are right there with Mara wondering if she is simply crazy or if there is a supernatural element to her life.  She wakes up from a coma to discover her friends all died in an accident she miraculously survived, only she has no memory of the night in question.  As she struggles to remember and get past what happened, she is haunted by hallucinations and nightmares.  Is she hallucinating or is what she sees really happening?  There is a good balance of mystery, intrigue, romance and psychosis.  Definitely worth unraveling.

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