Crossed by Ally Condie

Crossed is the sequel to Matched, a book I really liked reading. One of my friends gave me this book to read and I picked it up over the long weekend. What I found difficult was that I couldn't really remember how Matched ended and so I had a hard time following this book. That is one of the problems with reading trilogy as they are published instead of waiting for them to all to be published. Crossed picks up where Matched left off. Cassia is working in the Outer Provinces finishing up her three month work detail. The work is hard and she isn't sure exactly what she is accomplishing. All throughout her time at these camps she is thinking about Ky, wondering where he is and if he is safe. Ky is also in the outer provinces and he is just trying to stay alive so he can find his way back to Cassia. The story is told from alternative perspectives, one chapter from Ky's point of view and the next chapter from Cassia's. It is a story of love, and deciding what is right and wrong and how to best live your life. I enjoyed reading it, but I wish that I had reread Matched before starting this book. When the final book is published I will be sure to read the first two.

Starters by Lissa Price

I had read about Starters on Twitter a few months ago, it was being promoted for fans of the Hunger Games novels so I knew I was going to have to read it. When a former student showed me this one, I asked Emily to lend it to me when she was done. After a few reminders, she finally brought it to me this week, and am I ever glad she did. Starters is the story of life after a war in which everyone between the ages of twenty and sixty are wiped out. All that is left are the 'Starters' or the younger kids and the 'Enders', those at the end of their lives. There is a bit of tension between the two groups, laws have been passed that make it illegal for Starters to work which makes survival very difficult. Callie is the main character and she is a 16 year old who has been living on the streets trying to take care of her 7 year old brother as best she can. Callie learns of a way that she can make a great deal of money and all she has to do is 'rent' out her body to an Ender who wants a chance to relive their youth for a short period of time. For Callie, this seems like an ideal solution. She sleeps for a month while someone rents her body and when she wakes up she will be able to buy a home and look after her brother. Of course things don't go as planned for Callie. As she is being rented, she wakes up living someone else's life. She is confused and doesn't know who to trust. The more information she gets, the more confused and conflicted she becomes. This book was an incredibly exciting read. It was easy to follow and hard to put down. The ending leaves me thinking that there will be a planned sequel to the story, which is great because I really want to know what will happen to Callie and her brother. Fans of dystopian novels will really like this book.

Insurgent by Veronica Roth

Insurgent is a book that I have been waiting for for over a year. It is also the book that many of my students from last year have asked about as well. Insurgent is the sequel to Divergent and it begins at the exact moment where Divergent ends. Luckily I had reread Divergent just the weekend before, because otherwise I would have been a bit lost. If you haven't read Divergent, Insurgent might be a bit confusing for you. Once Tris decided on her faction, she thought she would be set for life. She was happy with her ranking as one of the top Dauntless initiates and was also happy with her future with Four. However all that changed at the end of Divergent, when war between the factions broke out. Now, Tris must deal with what she had to do to save herself, Four and what is left of her family. As she is trying to deal with all of that, she also has to figure out a way to stop the other faction from destroying themselves. This leads to Tris needing to make many difficult choices as she tries to navigate through the complexity of war.

I was so excited to start Insurgent and see what would happen with Tris and Four. I did find it a bit confusing to remember who was fighting for what side as I was reading. As with most wars, it is often hard to know who are the good guys and who are the bad guys. I love the strength that Tris has throughout both of these novels. While she feels remorse and guilt about decisions she makes, she always makes well thought out and planned moves. Anyone who liked Divergent should read this one. It is the second in the planned trilogy series and the ending certainly leaves you wanting to read the next book.

Partials by Dan Wells

Here is another book that has been recommended/given to me by Emily. I love it when she gives me books!
Partials is set sometime in the future after a war with the Partials, a group of human created artificial intelligent beings. The war with the Partials wiped out most of civilization and those that are left behind are no longer able to create new life because of a disease called RM. This is a real problem for the people still living. Most of their resources and energy go to finding a way to allow women to give birth and for these babies to live longer than a day.
Kira is 16 and she understands the dangers to a society who cannot create life. She is training to be a medic and wants nothing more than to help keep babies alive. Her and her friends realize that they need to take matters into their own hands in order to understand and find a cure for RM. Kira begins to realize that their enemy, the Partials may hold the key to most of their problems. She and a group of brave friends decide to take matters into their own hands to help society.

This book is really hard to explain, but it is a great read. There were times when it got a little heavy on the science, but it didn't really take away from the story if you didn't understand what was happening. This is a really great novel about how sometimes government and adults don't always have the answers and they must listen to the younger generation.

I would highly recommend this book, even though I don't feel I'm doing it justice here in this review.

Blood Red Road by Moira Young

I know this book has been sitting on my "What am I reading" spot for the last several months (I think it might actually have been there since September) and I really haven't been reading it that long. I did pick this book about almost a year ago and have actually given it to a student to read in the meantime. This student, Emily has great taste in books. Her and I like all the same books, so if she says a book is good, I know I'm going to like it as well. Emily told me after she had read it that I would like it, so I decided to move it up on my to be read pile!

Blood Red Road is a story about a family living in a post-apocalyptic world. The family is made up of the father and his three kids, 18 year old twins Lugh and Saba and 9 year old Emmi. Lugh and Saba are best friends, Saba cannot imagine her life without her brother. She follows him everywhere and lets him do all the thinking. She doesn't always agree with the way he treats their father, but she never goes against him. One day, Lugh is taken by a band of mysterious men on horseback and it is all Saba can do to carry on. But, she made a promise to Lugh that she would find him, even though that means setting out on her own into the unknown.

On her journey, Saba discovers who she is when she doesn't have her brother to depend on. She realizes she is a fighter, and she never gives up on her quest to find Lugh. She meets many people on her journey and has trouble trusting any of them. Mostly, she has trouble trusting Jack, a secretive but attractive boy.

I really really liked this book. The dialogue is a bit hard to follow at first. As with some dystopian novels, there seems to be a different language or slang to learn, but once I figured it out, it was a great read. Saba is this strong, confident, determined young woman who is a great role model for girls. The story is exciting and very fast paced. Even though the main character is female, I know many boys will like this book as well. It's a great read!

The Rivals by Daisy Whitney

The Rivals is the sequel to the book The Mockingbirds that I read just over a year ago. You don't really need to have read the first one to read this one, but it would probably be easier to understand. In The Mockingbirds, Alex is a student at a very prestigious private school. Every student enrolled is an overachiever and excels at something. The teachers believe that because these students agree to live by the school code of conduct, there is no need for any discipline. When Alex is date raped during a school party, she really has no where to turn and this is where the Mockingbirds come in. They are a student run organization that enforces the code of conduct and deal with issues that arrise when students cross the line. Alex was taken in by the Mockingbirds in the first book to help her deal with the terrible situation she found herself in.

Now, a year later, Alex is head of The Mockingbirds. She couldn't wait for school to start so that she could give back and help other students. Yet things aren't as easy or black-and-white as she thought they would be. Alex doesn't have confidence in herself as a leader and constantly finds herself crossing lines she never thought she would. She is faced with trying to balance her friends, her boyfriend and this organization she truly believes in, but has no idea how to steer. When rumours start surfacing that the school debating team is using drugs to win, Alex and the rest of the Mockingbirds feel they must investigate. This leads to hard feelings between those that Alex are closest to and she is often confused and unsure of herself.

I really loved The Rivals, I thought it was amazing watching how Alex went from victim to victor. I liked how in The Rivals she is unsure of herself and is still dealing with the aftermath of her rape. I think it wouldn't be accurate to have her be full of confidence and totally accepting of what happened to her. I liked watching her struggle with her morals and beliefs in this book. Growing up isn't easy and I really like it when books reflect this. I'm hoping that Whitney will be writing a third book in this series. I'd like to know what happens to Alex and the rest of her friends as they head off to college.

The Future of Us by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler

I can't believe how long it has been since I've read a YA book. I have been reading, just adult fiction lately. One of my students from last year dropped this book off the other day and after reading the front cover I realized I had to read it right away.
Jay Asher wrote a book I really loved called Thirteen Reasons Why
This book has been getting a lot of buzz on twitter and I knew I wanted to read it but I just hadn't picked it up yet.

Imagine being able to find out what your future life holds. But every time you check, your life has changed. This is the premise of this story. It is set in 1996, before the Internet and social media had really taken off. The story alternates between Emma and Josh, who are childhood friends but have lately drifted apart. When Josh brings over an AOL CD for Emma's new computer, they are suddenly able to access their future Facebook pages. On those pages they catch glimpses of their lives, although they are totally confused by many of the references- even what Facebook is exactly. As they try to live their lives normally, they realize that every decision and every action that occurs now affects their future.

This is such a cool premise for a book. I loved reading about life in 1996, but I also loved the fact that Josh and Emma had no idea what some of the things that are popular now are. It is pretty neat to think about that. It's also interesting to think about how you might change your life or decisions you make if you knew what your state of happiness might be in the future.

I thought this book was brilliantly written and explored such a neat concept. I can't wait to share this with my kids at school.