Cherub: The Recruit by Robert Muchamore

This book is the first in the Cherub series, and I gave it a rating of four out of five. James seems to always be getting into trouble, and he's surprised one day to wake up in a camp for young spy trainees. He is paired up with Kerry, and she helps him get through the three-month training program. The last four days of the training find the recruits traveling through the jungles of Malaysia. After gradutating, James is finally sent on his first mission to stop the assassination of the top oil executives in the world. The mission takes him into a rural compound of "hippies", but a few of the inhabitants are scary weird. James doesn't know how dangerous the terrorists can be, and he needs to discover this fact before it costs him his life. 

The name CHERUB may stand for something, but no one knows since the creator died. The exposition of the book is mostly about James' home life and all of the trouble he gets into. He doesn't look for trouble, but it seems to find him. The middle of the book deals with his training, and the last third of the book is the mission. I enjoyed the interaction of the characters, and girls will like how Kerry and Amy are able to kick James' butt. Amy is able to help James overcome his fear of water and actually learn to swim. Overall, it was a great book, and I assume the sequels will be able to jump right into the missions and action.

Bloody Jack by L.A. Meyer

My name is Mary "Jack" Faber. I'm a ship's boy on the Dolphin. Wait, that's not really true, because I'm actually a girl. Nobody on board knows it, and I'm real careful about keeping it secret. But that's not true either. I had to tell Jaimy I'm a girl on account of he likes me and thought it was weird liking a boy. Becoming a ship's boy keeps me from living on the streets, but it's still pretty dangerous hunting down pirates for His Majesty's Navy. A sleazy crewman named Sloat used to terrorize me, until I killed him with my shiv. It's getting harder to hide my body from the rest of the crew as I get older. I've got to get off this ship, but I don't want to leave Jaimy. I may not have any choice if I wait much longer.


Imagine, a young coming of age on a ship full of sailors! Jacky's secret is the big conflict in the book. She does her best to be an excellent ship's boy, and she helps form the Brotherhood with the other new boys on board. Female readers can identify with her development issues and the confusion she feels throughout. Male readers can enjoy the description of men living aboard an old sailing warship, as they hunt down pirates. Although there are action scenes, the book is more about Jacky coming to terms with her own identity. She joined the crew for survival, tried to be the best ship's boy possible, but couldn't deny her own feminism in the end. This book is not the kind I normally read, but it was pretty good.

Twisted Summer by Willo Davis Roberts

This book was written by the author of Don't Hurt Laurie, but I gave it a rating of three out of five. Cici's family always looks forward to summer vacation at the lakeside cottage with grandparents and cousins. The family wasn't able to visit last summer, and they just found out that a girl was murdered by the lake. Brody, the brother of a boy that Cici likes, was convicted of the crime and is now in prison. Cici decides that the evidence doesn't make sense, so she plays detective to discover the real murderer. However, she is surprised by some of her discoveries, and the murderer may know what she's up to. That can be deadly!

The plot was interesting, but I never really felt the suspense of the mystery. It seemed like Cici's detective work arose out of curiosity, so I didn't feel the conflict as much. The climax offered some tension, but that was during the last fourth of the book. There was an unexpected twist during the resolution of the plot.



The Calder Game by Blue Balliett

This book was written by the same author as Chasing Vermeer, and I gave it a rating of four out of five. Calder and his two friends enjoy finding adventure and looking for patterns in their lives. Calder was named after a famous artist, and many of the artist's sculptures start appearing all over the place. Calder and his father travel to England where they discover a new sculpture by the artist has recently been erected in a small village. Several days later, Calder and the large sculpture disappear. There are no clues as to what happened, and no one knows if the two disappearances are related. Calder's two friends are flown overseas to help the police find him. The more days that pass, the less chance there is that he will be found alive.

The plot was interesting, because Calder went from being the main character to the main conflict in the story. His disappearance is the main focus for the second half of the book. Readers will find themselves trying to figure out the location of the missing sculpture, and they will also start thinking like Calder to try to find him. The plot moved a little slowly for my liking, but having the main character disappear was unusual.

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Max Cassidy: Escape From Shadow Island by Paul Adam

I found this on a recommended summer reading list, and I gave it a rating of four out of five. Max is the son of a world-famous escape artist, and he's following in his father's footsteps. However, two years earlier, his father turned up missing in Santo Domingo, and his mother was convicted of his murder. A mysterious man tells Max that his father is still alive, but the man turns up dead before Max can get more details. Max heads to Santo Domingo to find information about his father's disappearance, but the local police are corrupt and try to force him back to England. Max figures out that the secrets he needs must be found on Shadow Island, and he's not going to leave until he finds some answers.

This plot is similar to the Alex Rider and Young James Bond books. Max doesn't have any super powers or fancy inventions, but he has the escape skills of his father. I enjoyed how he used these skills to escape from the corrupt police force and other dangerous characters. The action moved along nicely, and the author did a nice job of making the conflict grow as Max got closer to the truth. He was threatened, arrested, imprisoned, and nearly died while trying to escape. You should be prepared to read a sequel to this book, because Max is left with more searching to do after the story's resolution.

The Stalker by Joan Lowery Nixon

Nixon is a classic mystery writer for teens, and I gave this book a rating of four out of five. The mother of Jennifer's best friend is murdered, and the police arrest her friend for the crime. Jennifer doesn't believe it, so she convinces a retired police officer to help her find out the truth. They uncover some secrets about Stella Trax, the deceased mother, and find a number of other people who might have wanted to kill her. However, the killer knows what Jennifer is up to and is ready to stop her.

An interesting style to this book concerns the point of view. The odd number chapters tell the plot of the story in third-person, limited omniscient. The even number chapters are written in first-person from the killers point of view. This allows the reader to know the murderer's thoughts as Jennifer collects information. It's evident that the killer becomes more worried and threatening as Jennifer and the retired detective get closer to the truth.

The Red Blazer Girls: The Ring of Rocamadour by Michael Beil

This book was suggested by one of my students and our school librarian, and I gave it a rating of four out of five. Sophie, Margaret, and Rebecca are in school one day when Sophie notices a mysterious face looking at her from the building next door. It turns out the face belongs to an older woman with a mystery. Her father left her daughter scavenger-hunt clues to find a birthday gift, but he died before giving them to her. And that was about fifteen years ago. The husband was an archaeologist, and he said the gift would be a "treasure". The three girls follow the clues leading to the treasure, but they discover someone else is looking for it too. The treasure could be worth millions! The mysterious rival could be the ex-husband, the snoopy housekeeper, or someone else the kids don't suspect. To complicate things, a cute boy is involved which creates some conflict and distraction.

This book won't appeal to everyone. I found the clues interesting, because they seemed almost impossible to solve. I liked how the author made each clue related to a different school subject area. The setting was mostly in a school and the church next door, so that tended to decrease the suspense a bit. There were a couple of places where the author described the solution to the clues, almost like lessons in school. The climax was creative, and I liked how the author happily resolved all of the problems.