Stuck on Earth
by David Klass

The first two chapters of Stuck on Earth are some of the funniest, most attention-grabbing first pages of a novel that I've read in a while.  An alien space ship orbiting Earth is checking out the planet for possible colonization by the Lugonians, a species whose sun is about to go super nova.  Katchvar III, a snail-like creature, has been sent to Earth to inhabit the body of a 14-year-old boy, to evaluate the human race and determine whether it deserves to live or be exterminated.  It is a well-known fact that humans are very violent beings with little positive to be said about them.  Ketchvar's host body, Tom Filber, and his family just seem to prove what is already known--humans are mean and destructive and don't deserve the beautiful planet they inhabit.
        While this story has a funny beginning, not far into the book it becomes obvious how miserable and dysfunctional Tom's life really is.  It is questionable whether Ketchvar is a real alien, or an alternate personality that Tom uses to deal with his unhappy life.  That question hangs over the remainder of the novel, causing the reader to constantly wonder if this is an entertaining sci-fi novel, or an intense story about a troubled teen.  The budding relationship with the girl next door, Ketchvar's environmental project to research the cause of pollution in the local river, and Tom/Ketchvar's struggle to connect with his father make this a novel which can be read on several levels. You will have to decide for yourself whether or not Ketchvar III is a real being from outer space or a figment of Tom's imagination.  Stuck on Earth is on the 2012 Texas Lone Star Reading List and highly recommended.
             ~reviewed by Mrs. Sams

Epitaph Road

by David Patneaude

Earth in 2097 is a very different place than it had been in 2067.  After Elisha's Bear, the plague that wiped out 97% of Earth's male population, women had to take over everything--government, research, teaching, criminal justice, medicine--everything.  And with their control came stability, drastically reduced crime, environmental improvements, reduction of hunger and poverty.  The few men left in the world had two choices.  They could live extremely tightly controlled lives in the high population areas, or they could escape to the wilderness and become "throwbacks" or loners.  Fourteen-year-old Kellen lives in Seattle with his mother, an important official in PAC, the Population Apportionment Council, goes to school, studies constantly to pass his trials so that he might have a chance at a good job and fulfilled life.  His father is a loner and a fisherman, whom Kellen sees only rarely.  And though she had promised Kellen earlier that he could visit his father soon, she now keeps putting him off.  Kellen is becoming suspicious that something big is about to happen, and has little reason to fully trust his mother.  Eavesdropping, he learns that Elisha's Bear will be planted in the area where his father lives.  By doing online research guided by an unorthodox teacher, Kellen and two girls in his class begin to learn the truth about the plague, and decide to escape to the Olympic peninsula to warn his dad about the coming danger.  They couldn't possibly realize how dangerous this decision will be, and the unknown terror they are heading toward.   Epitaph Road is a different take on a future world which had been pulled back from the brink of destruction.  ~reviewed by Mrs. Sams

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THE MAZE RUNNER
By James Dashner

When Thomas wakes up in the dark lift, he remembers nothing about himself except his first name.  When the lift doors open, he is encircled by the faces of boys, maybe 50 or 60 boys, standing in an open glade.  Thomas has a million questions, but the leaders don't seem to be too patient.  However, over the course of several days, he discovers that he has been sent to a place which is enclosed by enormous stone walls.  Every morning, huge doors in the walls open on all four sides of the enclosure, and every evening the doors close.  The boys tell him the walls are for their protection because outside the walls in the maze that surrounds the compound, roam huge terrible bio-mechanical monsters call Grievers.
        Life inside the walls is highly organized with everyone having a specific job.  Supplies come up the lift on a regular basis, and once a month, a new boy arrives.   None of the boys know why they are there, but they believe they are there to figure out how to escape from the maze.  It's all a huge test; everything rests on the ability of the maze runners to figure out where the escape route is.  When there's a new arrival to the glade just one day after Thomas arrives, the first girl ever, the Gladers realize that everything is about to change and that the stakes are higher than ever.  A science fiction novel filled with tense action and terrifying mystery, The Maze Runner is book one of a series, and the reader is left guessing what else can possibly go wrong with the Gladers.  On this year's Texas Lone Star list.  
       --reviewed by Mrs. Sams

The Forest of Hands and Teeth

by Carrie Ryan

       Mary lives in an insulated world where, for all she knows, her village is the only one left in the world.  Beyond the fences surrounding the community is nothing but forest where the Unconsecrated, the undead, wander, moaning and hungering for the flesh of the living.  Ruling the village with ironclad rules and traditions is the Sisterhood, who live in the cathedral in the center of everything.  The sisters established the Guardians, men of the village whose job it is to mend and maintain the fences which have kept the townspeople safe ever since the Return.  And it is the sisters who decided in ages past how the infected are to be treated. 

       All her life, Mary has heard her mother's stories of life before the Return--stories of large cities with tall buildings.  Stories of the ocean, a body of water so vast that it disappears into the horizon.  She dreams of seeing that ocean someday, though it seems impossible.  She also dreams of a life with her childhood friend, Travis, even though he is betrothed to her best friend, Cass.  When her mother is bitten by an unconsecrated one day when Mary is not keeping close enough watch on her, her mother decides to leave the compound and search for her husband who had disappeared beyond the fence weeks before.  After that, Mary is rejected by her brother Jed and is forced to join the Sisterhood in the cathedral, since no man had spoken for her.  Mary feels angry and betrayed, but has no choices. 

       While in the cathedral, she begins to realize that the Sisterhood is keeping dark secrets about the history of her world, and she is determined to learn the truth and desires to look for the ocean more urgently than ever.  In an effort to keep Mary quiet and content, the Sisters approve a betrothal between Mary and Harry, Travis's brother, but before the marriage can be completed, there is a breach in the fence and the Unconsecrated overrun the village, scattering the townspeople in terror.  Mary, Harry, Cass, Travis, Jed, his wife Beth, and a small boy, escape down a fenced path into the forest, the Unconsecrated dogging their every step.  This dark journey away from everything they have ever known to be true, is a dangerous and eye-opening experience, causing the travelers to make heart-breaking decisions of life and death.  This story of a world ravaged by plague, is on next year's Tayshas list.     ~reviewed by Mrs. Sams

      

     

SKINNED
by Robin Wasserman

For readers of Scott Westerfeld's Uglies series, the cover of this book may look familiar, and it would be tempting to assume that the storyline is similar.   Lia Kahn's physical body is really the main character in this book, and there the similarities end.  Skinned takes place in a future, post-nuclear accident America, where the rich have every possible advantage and the poor live in unhealthy squalor.  Medical science has advanced to the point that a person's mind can be downloaded into a beautiful mechanical body, but those who have had the procedure done, either by choice or because their bodies have become so damaged that they had no choice, if they wanted to continue to exist, are looked at as inhuman, souless machines.  They are the outcasts of society.  After a horrifying accident, Lia's father decides to save her by giving her a mechanical body. She is then faced with not only adjusting to the physical changes, the change in her social status, but much more importantly, dealing with who and what she has become emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually.  This book poses all the difficult questions about what it means to be human, whether there is a god and spiritual life, and what the responsibility is of those who are virtually indestructible to those who aren't.  None of these problems are solved, but at the end, Lia is at last ready to consider the questions.  Skinned is Book One in a trilogy which promises to be full of action and thought-provoking angst.  ~reviewed by Dail Sams

The Ask and the Answer
by Patrick Ness

After running for weeks to reach Haven and escape Mayor Prentiss and his men, Todd carries the wounded Viola into the town square of Haven, only to find the Mayor waiting there for them. So ends Book One of the Chaos Walking trilogy.  The intensity never lets up in Book Two, The Ask and the Answer, as Todd and Viola are separated, manipulated, and deceived by the Mayor and others with their own agendas.  Viola finds herself aligned with a rebel group of women called the Answer, led by Mistress Coyle, a healer and adept strategist for planning terrorist attacks on the city.  Meanwhile, Todd is a virtual prisoner of Mayor Prentiss, and is made to do increasingly cruel and immoral acts.  He doesn't have the will to resist because he believes Viola has left him alone on purpose.  His means of enduring is to turn off his emotions entirely and refuse to think about the pain he is inflicting on women of the city and the Spackle, natives of the planet.  As the Answer steps up their terrorist attacks, Mayor Prentiss responds with his own brand of evil cruelty in the Office of the Ask.  Both groups are trying to solidify their own power before the arrival of Viola's people in their space ship.  The final agonizing scene of this powerful story finds the Ask and the Answer racing toward a final battle on the outskirts of the city, the spaceship nearing arrival, and Todd finally gaining a tenuous control over the Mayor inside the now destroyed cathedral, when out of the hills a totally unexpected conquering force marches toward the city.  This is the epitome of a "cliff hanger."  As with the first in this trilogy, The Knife of Never Letting Go, I found this story incredibly painful to read, but once begun, there's no stopping. This saga is so much more than science fiction.  --reviewed by Mrs. Sams

CATCHING FIRE

By Suzanne Collins

Though Katniss and Peeta have been given a few short months of peace and prosperity following their victory in the Hunger Games, it is inevitable that Katniss, at least, would be punished by President Snow for her defiance at the end of the games. Refusing to kill Peeta has sparked rebellion in a number of the districts, infuriating government officials. Punished she is, in many and excruciating ways. The most painful way of all is the announcement by the government that she and Peeta will be going back into the arena for the Quarter Quell, the 75th anniversary of the Hunger Games. Katniss has no hope that she will survive the games a second time. Even if she could, she has already made the decision to protect Peeta as long as she can and sacrifice herself to keep him alive. Returning to the diabolical arena are a host of tributes from past games, some there just to stay alive as long as they can, but others allied together to spark further rebellion. Collins has followed up her highly acclaimed The Hunger Games with another turn in the arena guaranteed to keep readers racing through the pages and begging for more at the cliff-hanger ending. ~reviewed by Mrs. Sams

The

Hunger Games

by Suzanne Collins

It's Reaping Day again in Panem, and every person in each of the 12 districts is required by the government to dress in his or her best clothes and appear in the city square for the lottery. Two teenagers from each of the districts, one boy and one girl, will be chosen for the annual Hunger Games, a contest among the 24 teenagers from all the districts, televised across the country. The Hunger Games, is just one way that the Capitol wields its power over its citizens, for everyone is afraid their child, or their friend, will be chosen, and no one is powerful enough to resist. This year, 12--year-old Prim is chosen, but her older sister, Katniss immediately volunteers to take her place. Katniss and Peeta, the baker's son, leave that day for the Capitol, a place of unimaginable luxury, where they, along with the other contestants from the other districts are pampered and fed and coached for days before the games begin. But none of the riches they are given can really ease the terror of what they will encounter when the Hunger Games commence. For the Hunger Games is a challenge to the death, and only one teen can be the victor!

This dystopian novel is reminiscent of Shirley Jackson's story, The Lottery, with elements of Big Brother in Orwell's 1984. Panem is a frightening future North America, the land area vastly reduced because of global warming, flooding, natural disasters, and war. But the main characters are strong, appealing survivors, and the action runs the gamut from sweet and touching acts of selflessness to brutal savagery, with the government being the true bad guy. I loved this book! It has everything a good read should have, and the best thing of all is that the sequel , Catching Fire, is due out in September. The Hunger Games is on this year's American Library Association's Top Ten best books for young adults, and the 2009-2010 Texas Tayshas list. --reviewed by Dail Sams