The Knife of Never Letting Go - By Patrick Ness

At first glance, The Knife of Never Letting Go appears to be another coming of age story. Todd Hewitt, the last boy in Prentisstown, is one month from entering manhood. Sounds normal, right? Add in the fact that there are no women in Prentisstown and everyone can hear each other's thoughts. Not normal at all.

After finding something Todd never expected to find- a girl, his life changes entirely. Before long, Todd, his dog, Manchee and Viola, the girl, must escape Prentisstown. With only a knife and some vague directions from an old map, he must embark on a perilous journey to uncover the truth of Prentisstown and what it really takes to be a man. He discovers that what he knows might not always be true and the truth can be false.

The creation of Todd's world is very cleverly done. The author created Noise, the term used for men's never ending stream of thought. The fact that Todd's thoughts cannot be hidden form other's allows the book to build up the element of surprise and suspense.

After I finished the book, I was emotionally exhausted. The ending was very unexpected; it was like a punch in the stomach when I finished. I anxiously await for the next book to come out

Plain Truth By Jodi Picoult

This book is about how a dead infant found on an Amish farm shakes the entire community. An eighteen-year-old, unmarried Amish girl, Katie Fisher, is accused of murdering her newborn baby. As the police investigate the death, they discover that the baby was not stillborn, but died shortly time after birth. Katie Fisher is charged with murder of her new-born son. Ellie Hathaway, a distant relative of Katie, reluctantly accepts the case. If you want to know the rest of the story, you will have to read the book.

I think the book Plain truth has a very surprising plot. The author Jodi Picoult understands a lot about the Amish people to make us understand the irony and the impossibility of Plain folk facing our legal system. It is a great story about values and choices and cultural assumptions. I highly recommend this book. It's a good legal drama with keen psychological study of a unique culture. Jodi Picoult's novel is very readable and you can’t stop reading it after you started. There is so much more about this story than what I wrote in the paragraphs, so you got to read it!

Jumping the Scratch ~ Sarah Weeks

Do you ever get the feeling that whenever something bad happens, there are worse things to come? Well that was what Jamie Reardon assumed when his cat Mister died and his father left his mother for another woman. Most importantly, his aunt Sapphy had a huge accident in the cherry factory that caused her to be unable to store new memories. She was like a scratched record that kept on repeating the same line over and over again, but unlike everybody else, Jamie wanted to help his aunt "Jump the scratch" and carry on with her life.

Unfortunately there is one more bad thing in store for Jamie-something he'd give anything to be able to forget, and this one leaves himself feeling like a complete stranger in the world. One of Jamie's neighbors is a girl in his class called Audrey. She is smart like him, and slowly they become friends. She said that she could hypnotize people, and he wondered whether she could help him with forgetting his secret. However, thinking about what happened to him just made him want to tell someone else about it.

Jamie tries in vain to find the magic trigger that would help Sapphy's memory 'Jump the scratch', like the needle on her favourite Frank Sinatra record, but in the end it is aunt Sapphy and Audrey who helps him unravel the mysteries of memory and jump the scratch in his own life. Jamie never thought that Jamie's horrible secret would be the key for his aunt to jump the scratch as well.

I would recommend this book to anybody from the age of eleven to one hundred and one because it will completely soften your heart and let you know what bad luck really is!

This miraculous book tells a story of a young teenage boy who has gone through a lot of obstacles to overcome what he has gone through. I found this book very interesting and memorable. The part of the book is that you find out what Jamie's horrible secret is at the very end of the book. This develops a cool twist that leaves your mind spinning. Want to know the ugly secret Jamie has to lock up in his heart and cover? Want to know why he would do anything to forget it? There is only one way you can find out. Read the book and uncover his heart-breaking story!

Beautiful Boy by David Sheff

Beautiful Boy is a story about drug addiction and Nic, the main character in the story, started smoking and using marijuana since he was in 7th grade. One of the reasons why he started using drug was because of his parents’ divorce when he was only about 3. Nic thought that marijuana would help him blocked out his feelings when he felt too much, and it also made things blurrier. After going to therapies and lectures by his dad, Nic was influenced by his dad’s talk about how drugs were bad for his health and how it will affect your life afterwards. Things started to turn well when he was in 8th grade; he stopped hanging out with the friends who sold him the drug. He started to read massive amount of books, which helped him to become the award- winning journalist. He started to work hard, wanting to get good grades so he could enter an university. Through Nic’s hard working, he entered an university in Los Angeles which forced him to leave his family, and that was when he started the drug, meth.

This book was written from parents’ point of view, so that we could feel how the parents felt when they were facing their child’s addiction to drugs. I think this is a really interesting book, because through the storylines, we could actually see the way Nic changed and the way the parents reacted. This is one of the most depressing stories I have ever read before, and I recommend teenagers to read this book.

The Other Sister-S.T Underdahl

Josey Muller's regular life of homeowork, guys, and gossip was blown away when her parents dropped a bomb: she has an older sister that she never knew about. Her parents were overjoyed to reunite with Audrey, the baby they were forced to give up in high-school. Everyone was cool with this. Somehow, this was just not so easy for 16 year old Josey, to accept this fact. She had been playing along well, until one day. She finally cannot hold this anymore, and suddenly, a torrence of uncontrollable words came out of her mouth. Tears started to roll down her cheeks. How are her parents going to react? Read this book and find out.
I really enjoyed reading this book, because of how the tension was built. The way Josey dealed with things were sometimes not very mature, but she certainly got to her point, and made sure that everyone knew how she felt. Some parts of this book was emotional and I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading about family issues.

Someone Like You

The title of the book is "Someone Like You" the author is "Sarah Dessen" she is also the author of "This Lullaby". Someone Like You is for young teen girls ages 13 and up. The content might be too serious for 12 years olds and down, because it has some adult matter in the book. I had a fantastic time reading this book. The author wrote this book by giving a lot details.

The main character is a 16 year old girl named Halley, she is the kind of girl who is always quite and shy, but she can also be fun once you get to know her. The second main character is Halley's best friend seen they were kids, her name is Scarlett she is fun, outgoing, and makes friends very fast. One other character, that is important is Halley's mother, she is a woman who talks about every that is wrong when she sees it, she will never let it go, until you apologize, or make it right.

Halley and Scarllet have been best friends since they were little kids. Since they were little Scarllet had always kown what to do, when things got rough, But things start to change at the begining of their junior year. Scarllets boyfriend Michael got killed in a motorcycle accident; and then Scarllet finds out that she is carrying Michaels baby. Scarllet really needs Halley now, now Halley has to learn how to be strong, Halley know she can't let Scarllet down. Because a true friend is a promise you can keep forever.

Firesong - By William Nicholson

Kestrel and Bowman are twins, who possess the power to communicate with their minds. Unlike Bowman, Kestrel is strong- willed and defiant, whereas Bowman is calm and usually the one who is more sensitive.

The story picks up with the escape of the Hath family from the Mastery, along with other willing Manth families and friends. They seek their homeland. Despite the wintry conditions, they know they are heading the right way, but thye grow weaker and weaker with starvation. Ira Hath is the only one who knows the way, but she is dying. She knows that according to the prophesy, she will die when they reach the homeland.

Bowman must sacrafice himself for his family and people and awaits his calling to join the Singer people, who must stop and destroy the Morah. it is prophesied that he will die as the Chosen one.

Will Bowman recieve his calling in time, or will the Morah rise again and cause chaos and destruction? That is for you to find out.

Are You There God? Its me, Margaret by Judy Blume.

This is a book I read when I was 12, it was my birthday present from my friend's mom. For girls, we go through puberty when we're 12 (well, on average) and my friend's mom thought that it was a "guide" for me, and the book did help me. Its also about religious intolerance, like against Jewish and etc.

This book is basically about this girl named Margaret who's in sixth grade and has no religion. And throughout the book you can see the process and the problems she faced during her quest for a single religion. She's also confronted by many preteen females issues such as buying her first bra, having her first period and coping with belted sanitary pads, jealousy towards another girl who has developed womanly figure earlier than others, liking boys and voicing opinions if it differs from other girlfriends.

The book is quite simple so that's all I can say about the book or else there won't be any surprise when you read it. :) I recommend young girls to read it like, Year 5-7s. don't really recommend boys it read it, of course.

So Much To Tell You by John Marsden

This is a book I read a while back and thought it would be interesting to share. Its the story of a young girl, Marina, who has a very troubled life, she is a mute. She also has a scared face given to her by her father due to an acid spill after the accident she refuses to talk to anyone during recovery and her mother (who grows tired of her being mute) sends her to Warrington Boarding School in an effort to improve her communication, but even there she continues to silence. Until her English teacher Mr Lindell gives the glasses journals to write in, Mariana takes to it a sort of a joke writing down very trivial things about her life at school, but as time goes on she starts to write more deep things and this becomes her only source of communication, as the book progresses she meets a girl by the name of Cathy Preshill, she is the closest thing Marina has to a friend she is tall and thin and likes to read poetry, by the end of the book she goes to meet her father in what appears to be prison but the author isn't clear. And says her only words in the entire book: "Hello, Dad," and "I've got so much to tell you..."

This is a book that nearly every teenager in the world should read its got the whole deal: boys and girls, sex and family defiantly a good book that I love reading and its won a few awards which is cool too :)

Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer

Eclipse the third book of the Twilight Saga, continues the story of Bella Swan and her vampire love with Edward Cullen. In this book Bella is presented with a choice, one that would decide the fate of all characters involved in this novel; to choose to marry Edward and become a vampire or to love Jacob and stay human. The broken ribbon on the cover of the book represents these two options, they also represent Bella struggling to find the correct answer.

Continuing from the previous book New Moon Bella gets back with loving Edward but sees a new problem as Jacob Black also loves her. To complicate things even more, Jacob Black is a "Shape-Shifter Wolf" aka werewolf who's worst enemy is Edward Cullen because he is a vampire. As the story progresses, Bella found out that one of her die-hard old enemies has summoned an army to kill her, because of this she required the cooperation of both the vampires and the werewolfs to join and defeat the army. The question is will the two enemies cooperate to battle the army? More importantly, who will Bella pick? Edward Cullen or Jacob Black.

This book is recommended to any one who likes a bit of a chill mixed with sweet romance, although it is better if not already to start reading from the first book of the series, "Twilight".

The Vampire Diaries by L.J. Smith

This book is by far the best book I've ever read, well the only series of book I've ever read actually. I don't read books in the past but after watching the drama on TV (and this is very different from Twilight and way more interesting), which kept me in so much suspense that I couldn't stand it anymore and went to the bookstore and bought the whole series back and read all the way from the beginning.

This series contains up to 6 books (one still unpublished till late 2010 or early 2011) and it is about two Salvatore brothers who fell in love with a girl named Katherine in 1864. They had no idea that she was a vampire until she turned the both of them into vampires. There were a lot of hatred between the brothers because of Katherine and they couldn't even stand the sight of seeing each other. As a vampire, you get to live an eternal life which the Salvatore brothers did. And now in 2006, Stefan Salvatore met Elena, queen bee of high school who looks exactly like Katherine but with the exact opposite personalities. Elena has two best friends, Bonnie, who discovers to be a witch/psychic eventually and Meridith who's oddly calm with all that's happening. Stefan and Elena fell in love very soon and Damon tried to ruin the relationship by trying to turn Elena into a vampire because of both the hatred he has for Stefan and how impossibly alike Elena and Katherine looks.

There are many twists in the series and I love the book very much. I know every young adult of our generation would like it too since we're being called the "Vampire-kids" these days after the Twilight craze.

My Sister's Keeper-Jodi Picoult

Every now and then, you will read a book that really touches your heart, and leaves you thinking long after you had finished it. Well for me, one of those books is called, "My Sister's Keeper."
Anna Fitzgerald, a thirteen year old girl, who had gone through a few painful operations to provide bone marrow and blood to keep her sister Kate alive, had decided to go against her parents. Kate has suffered from leukemia, a type of cancer since she was two. Anna had been forced to donate one of her kidneys to her sister. She hired a lawyer, Campbell Alaxander, to sue her parents for the rights of her body. Will Anna win this case and watch her sister die, or will she be persuaded to give up one of her kidneys? Read this book and find out.
I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading about relationships and emotions. It's a well plotted book and keeps your head burried to the book until the last page. I also recommend a box of tissue ready because it's a book that really gets you.

Crusade - By Elizabeth Laird

This story develops on two tracks, one follows Adam, a christian serf of an English baron; the other follws Salim, a muslim apprentice of a well respected doctor.

This story is set in the medival times. When Salim, a merchant's son in Acre; when he hears that the city is being attacked by crusaders. To keep him safe, his dad sends him off with a doctor as an apprentice. Acre, also known as the Holy Land, had once been ruled by the crusaders until the great muslim, Saladin took it back. They are then captured by Saladin's army to look after the sick in Saladin's camp.

On the other hand, Adam, who had just recently buried his mother, embarks on a perilous journey to take Acre back from Saladin. He also wants to Once they arrive, they lay seige to Acre and crushes the city with the help of King Richard. Thats when the lives of the two boys link together. Not every encounter is a good one.

The Last Song- Nicholas Sparks

Veronica "Ronnie" Miller won't be eighteen until the end of the summer, so she has to follow her mom's rules and is off with her younger brother, Jonah, to spend the summer with her dad in a North Carolina beach town. Ronnie hasn't talked to her dad in over three years. He left New York City and their family and moved back to his hometown. Ronnie is rebellious and having been arrested for shoplifting back home, a quiet summer in North Carolina might be the best thing for her. At least that's what her mother thinks.

Ronnie arrives with the intention of ignoring her dad. On her first night there she wanders the beach and meets a girl, Blaze, who seems okay. But Blaze is addicted to Marcus, and Marcus is bad news. And Marcus is interested in Ronnie. Ronnie can tell Marcus is trouble and tries to avoid him. But the triangle will ultimately create problems.

On a brighter note, Jonah is totally content in North Carolina and with spending time with his father. He has no desire to return to New York City. Jonah has joined his father in creating a replacement stained glass window for a church that burned in town.

As the summer unfolds, Ronnie falls in love with a local boy, Will. She discovers the wonders of Loggerhead turtles. And she learns to trust her father all over again. As the summer comes to a close, more than one tragedy occurs, and Ronnie must face some hard truths in her life.

I have to admit that it's been a while since I truly loved one of Mr. Sparks' novels. Don't get me wrong, I do adore his work. But it's been ages since I sat down with one of his books and found myself with tears in my eyes. This was one of those rare stories. With about forty pages to go in the novel, I found myself with wet eyes and the sniffles.

Crocodile Tears by Anthony Horowitz

A fourteen-year-old teenage boy called Alex Rider had been recruited as a spy since the death of his uncle, Ian Rider. He had saved the world six times within a year, but the costs were: a wound from a sniper, fighting with someone twice the size of him, having your friends and family in danger or even worse.

Finally, this time he thought that he could get away from being a teenage spy and continue his school life just like other ordinary people.

However, another ambitious person wanted to rule the world again. But this time, Alex will face something unimaginable...

On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer

The book ‘On My Honor’ by Marion Dane Bauer is a story about a boy named Joel Bates and his best friend Tony Zabrinsky. They are neighbors and are as close as brothers. Tony always has these crazy ideas that may cause them to die. Joel doesn’t like Tony’s crazy ideas, but he still plays with Tony. One day, Tony tells Joel that he wants to climb the bluffs of Starved Rock Park. Joel doesn’t want Tony to think that he is scared, so he pretends to be brave and asks his dad for permission by not mentioning about climbing the bluffs. Joel’s dad normally doesn’t give them the permission. But today, Joel’s dad somehow thinks they are old enough to go to Starved Rock Park. While they are riding their bikes, Tony looks at the Vermillion river, and challenges Tony to swim. When Joel reaches the sand bar, he cannot find Tony. The book ends in tragedy. Joel was too late to save Tony.

I strongly recommend this book because it is very interesting. It shows me something about human nature. Human are special creatures. They feel scared to tell the truth because they don't want to be punished. I learned a lot and this book has many interesting and surprising parts.

Shopaholic & Sister

In the beginning, Becky Bloomwood returns to Britain with her husband, Luke after nearly a year of honeymoon all over the globe to surprise her family and friends. She then realizes that she has changed plenty, however, the world she knew back in Britain hasn't. When she arrvies home, Becky ends up being the most surprised when she finds out about unexpected things such as: her best friend Suze now has a new close friend, she now has a sister, Jess, which in her absence her parents discovered, her husband is no longer "the husband" she knew before their honeymoon, her parents are determined to work hard on their marriage and she is still a shopaholic.
Becky soon finds out how Jess is the complete opposite of her and seem to not be able to get along. Therefore, she tries to do every thing she can to make up for her absence...

Twenties Girl by Sophie Kinsella

Lara Lington is a qualified twenty-something woman who has always had an active mind, but suddenly her thoughts seem to be on auto pilot. She is getting visited by ghosts, the spirit of her great-aunt Sadie who mysteriously appears to her. Sadie was a lively, tough girl with set ideas about fashion, love, and the right way to dance. Sadie has one last request that Lara must find a misplaced necklace that had been in Sadie’s possession for more than seventy-five years, and Sadie cannot rest without it. But Lara, on the other hand, has a many enduring distractions. Her greatest friend and business partner has run off to Goa, her start-up company is struggling, and she’s just been deserted by her “perfect” man.But Sadie, however, is not bothered about this. Lara and Sadie make a funny duo, and at first it seems as though they have nothing in common. But as the task to find Sadie’s necklace leads to new romance for Lara, these very unlike “twenties” girls learn alot from each other along the way. Twenties Girl is an very moving book that inspires bonds of friendship and family. I highly recommend this book to girls specially. Enjoy reading!

kira-kira by Cynthia Kadohata

This book is about two sisters, and a family who moves from Iowa, to the Deep South of Georgia because of their fathers job. Lynn the older sister has her own way of viewing the world who teaches her younger sister, Katie, to look beyond tomorrow. Lynn is the one always explaining, that there is a always a reason. Glittering, is how she makes everything seem. The sky is kira-kira, the colour is deep but also see-through. The sea is for the same reason.

Soon in the book, their family finds out that Lynn, becomes desperately ill and the whole family starts to fall apart. Now it is up to Katie to remind the others that there is always something that is glittering (kira-kira) in the future, and it makes everything worth seeing and remembering.

What I liked about this book is that, their family was always there to help Lynn and to support her, when she was ill, and that it was like nothing could break them apart. This book makes readers see the world a little more different in what they thought it was like. It is a book of family, friendship and love; trusting other people.

The Hunger Games By: Suzanne Collins

This is a interesting book about a kid trying to survive in a game called the Hunger games and the game key is to survive in the wild until all the contestants dies and you will win.

At First Katniss got selected for the hunger games tribute and she went out to fight for their district but what will happen to her mom and her younger sister, what will they do for a living?? Can Katniss win the fight and bring peace to all these?? Even though that her father taught her a lot of skills to survive in the Wilderness, she didn't know how to kill people. Can she kill all 12 people and come back safely?

This book is recommended to students and adults, it is 300 pages long but it's an interesting book to describe how she can survive in the wild and face all those wealthy people who was trained to do this??