Ball Peen Hammer by Adam Rapp and George O’Connor
First Second, 2009, 144 pp., $17.99

Graphic Novel
ISBN: 978-1-59643-300-7

Ball Peen Hammer , a graphic novel by Adam Rapp and illustrated by George O’Connor, depicts a gruesome, dying world. Not for the faint of heart, this story is unrelenting in its despair and loss. Welton hides in his basement room to avoid the plague that has killed or infected most of the world. He fears leaving the safe space, but that isolation causes its own damage to his life.

The story, filled with the suffering of the characters, is not for readers with weak stomachs, as the visuals of devoured bodies, inhumane acts, and violence are heart-wrenching. The characters feel as if there is no hope in their dying world, and they sometimes participate in violent acts, often out of apathy.

The graphic novel provides a gruesome view of a world where characters feel intensely their loss of hope. It is eerie in its storytelling and its vision.

Melanie Hundley
Nashville, TN

Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Little, Brown, 2010, 628 pp., $17.99

Fantasy/Romance
ISBN: 978-0-316-04267-3

When the niece of his small town’s shut-in enrolls in school, Ethan Wate rejects the idea of ever being friends with her. Lena Duchannes, however, is more than Ethan bargained for—beautiful, different, and unexpectedly powerful. She is a caster—possessing the power to instantly transform her natural surroundings. Ethan discovers a strong attraction to Lena, sharing her dreams, seeing into her mind, and learning a secret about their family histories that connects them. But Lena’s time in Gatlin, SC, is short: She has six months until her sixteenth birthday, where she’ll learn her fate as a caster—to be dark or to be light, to be evil or to be good, to have Ethan or to lose him forever.

The authors weave Southern history and charm with Gothic sensibilities throughout the story. Boasting a strong male narrator, Beautiful Creatures is a fresh, pleasantly enjoyable take on the YA thriller/romance.

Lacy Compton
Austin, TX

Daniel X: Alien Hunter by James Patterson and Leopoldo Gout
Little Brown Books for Young Readers, 2008, 128 pp., $9.99

Graphic Novel
ISBN: 978-0-316-00425-1

Daniel X looks just like any other human being, eats like any other human being, sleeps like any other human being, except, well, he is not like any other human being; in fact, he is not even human. Daniel X is a humanoid from the plant Terra Firma, and he is an Alien Hunter. As a child, his parents were killed by THE Most Wanted Alien criminal of that time. Years later, Daniel goes back and finds the List, an artifact created to hold the knowledge of Terra Firma and each Alien Hunter before him. With the list, it is time to continue what his parents started.

Alien Hunter is the newest installment in the Daniel X series; Daniel is hunting Alien Number 7 on the list. Through some unexpected turns of events, Daniel becomes the hunted. The story carefully combines the narrative, dialogue, and illustrations.

Isaac Gabella
Ferney-Voltaire, France

Death on the River by John Wilson
Orca Book Publishers, 2009, 224 pp., $12.95

Historical Fiction/ War/ Redemption
ISBN: 978-1-55469-111-1

Death on the River is a story about a young Union soldier who is captured and placed in a Confederate prison camp at Andersonville. While there, he meets Billy Sharp, a man who teaches Jake how to survive the hardships of war life, but only at the cost of others. The end of the Civil War allows Jake to make his way home, only to discover more heartache and death. The imprisoned Union soldier is not a point-of-view typically encountered when reading about the Civil War.

Death on the River is a book that forces its readers to venture beyond the vacant facts of war toward the turmoil and guilt experienced by those who are “the one who lived.” Jake’s retelling of his final year as a soldier is both grotesque and heart-wrenching as the reader follows Jake in a world filled with starvation, death, violence, greed, and ghosts.

Kimberly Coyle
Nashville, TN

Elf Realm: The High Road by Daniel Kirk
Amulet Books, 2009, 488 pp., $18.95

Fantasy/Adventure
ISBN: 978-0-8109-4075-8

Book Two of the Elf Realm trilogy, The High Road offers in complexity what it lacks in character, introducing multiple new characters and increasingly menacing threats to the realm. Matt and Becky are again trying to preserve the Cord, the connection between the elf realm and the human world. In this installment, their quests are separate, providing more adventure but, unfortunately, more opportunity for the story to go awry. Attentive readers will notice when the magical rules of the elf realm contradict each other. Although the complex, multiple plots require the concentration of an older reader, the simpler, more predictable characters are more appropriate for younger readers. Falling short of the coherence of well-crafted fantasy, The High Road is most appropriate for readers who prefer traditional battle books.

Catherine McTamaney
Nashville, TN

Finally by Wendy Mass
Scholastic Press, 2010, 304 pp., $16.99

Growing Up/ Humor
ISBN: 978-0-545—05242-9

Finally introduces Rory, a spunky and clumsy preteen who finds herself in awkward social situations. Rory’s story is sparked when she finally turns twelve, and can do all the things her parents promised that she could do at that age. On B-Day, Rory finally gets to work on her goals.

Get her own house key. Check
Shave her legs. Check
Get a cell phone, wear makeup, and get a pet. Check, Check, and Check.

If only accomplishing her list was so easy! Along the way, Rory gets into some scary situations and always seems to land in a less than graceful manner. Rory’s family and friends keep her laughing and teach her that turning twelve means more than just checkmarks on a page.

Mass’s writing style is witty; she gets into the mind of a twelve-year-old girl spinning a humorous story that makes readers laugh out loud.

Chantelle Pritchett
Derby, KS

If I Stay by Gayle Forman
Dutton Books, 2009, 196 pp., $16.99

Family/Choices/Relationships
ISBN: 978-0-525-42103-0

Seventeen-year-old Mia has a great life: she has a close-knit family, her band-playing boyfriend is loving and devoted to her, and her talent as a cellist has almost certainly earned her a place at Julliard, her dream school. The only decision Mia really has to make is which path she wants to follow. At least, she thought that was the only decision she had to make. One ride with her family during a school snow day, however, changes everything.

Suddenly, there’s only one decision Mia has to make—a critical decision that she has to make as she watches the paramedics work on her body. It’s the most important decision of all, and she has to make it all on her own: stay, or go?

Christine Halkovic
Ansonia, CT

Last Night I Sang to the Monster by Benjamin Alire Saenz
Cinco Puntos Press, 2009, 239 pp., $16.95

Addiction/ Death/Abuse
ISBN: 987-1-933693-58-3

Zach is an alcoholic. He has many secrets that he keeps hidden in the confines of his sadness. Instead of attending his senior year of high school, Zach finds himself in a rehab facility having to face his monstrous memories of drugs, alcohol, abuse, and death. The only problem is Zach doesn’t want to remember, because with remembering comes excruciating pain. Together with the help of his therapist and his fatherly roommate, Zach is able to face his monsters and break through the chaos of his internal world. Zach struggles through the labyrinth of addiction, ending up in a circle of hope and love.

Saenez’s novel artfully depicts the delicate world of the addict—the struggles, the setbacks, and the moments of light that create a path toward healing. This powerful and emotionally demanding story will resonate in teenage minds for a long time.

Kimberly Coyle
Nashville, TN

March toward the Thunder
by Joseph Bruchac
Speak, an imprint of Penguin Group, 2009, 298 pp., $8.99

Civil War/ Irish Brigade/Native American
ISBN: 978-0-14-241446-0

Through the summer of 1864, Grant’s Union army mounted a campaign that taxed Lee’s Confederate troops to the limit. Lee’s army inflicted severe casualties, but suffered from the inability to resupply and recruit more soldiers. Grant pushed forward, assured of a continued source of supplies and troops. In this context, fifteen-year-old Louis Nolette, an Abenaki Indian, accepts a payment bonus to join the Union army. This money allows his mother to buy and maintain land in New York. Louis is assigned to the Irish Brigade, one of the Union’s most decorated units.

Bruchac’s historical novel depicts the tragedy of war in the midst of courage, brotherhood, sacrifice, racial strife, and death. Louis’s first-person narrative of a boy in battle reminds us not only of the horror of war, but of the ever-present role that Native Americans have played in the unfolding story of American history.

Steve Bickmore
Baton Rouge, LA

Rapunzel’s Revenge
by Shannon and Dean Hale
Illus. Nathan Hale
Bloomsbury, 2008, 144 pp., $14.99

Adventure/Growing Up/Self Discovery
ISBN: 978-1-59990-070-4

If you loved The Goose Girl and Book of a Thousand Days , you are in for another treat. In Rapunzel’s Revenge , author Shannon Hale partners with Dean Hale and Nathan Hale to retell the Grimm’s classic as a graphic novel.

This is definitely not your grandmother’s Rapunzel—the quietly submissive, long-suffering princess, waiting for the prince to rescue her. The Hales’s updated teenager-in-a-tower has a big heart, strong braids, and a swashbuckling, high-energy, big-adventure story to tell. This Rapunzel is “WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE for horse thieving, kidnapping, jail breaking, and using her hair in a manner other than nature intended!”

While Rapunzel’s Revenge is definitely the stuff of high adventure and the old West, it is very much a story about growing up female, taking chances, negotiating potentially dangerous landscapes, confronting cruelty and loss, and re-finding the nurture and comfort that can be had in love.

Phyllis Thompson
Johnson City, TN

Rebound by Bob Krech
Marshall Cavendish, 2006, 271 pp., $6.99

Adolescence, Sports, Racial Issues
ISBN: 978-0-7614-5543-1

Polish American kids from the Greenville working-class, rustbelt neighborhood don’t play basketball; they wrestle. Ray Wisniewski doesn’t want to buy into the idea that black kids play hoops and white kids wrestle. Ray is determined to overcome this.

Krech’s story of “teenager tries to make good” is another reminder that subdivisions, barriers, and bigotry can pollute a school. Ray learns a hard lesson when he couldn’t make the basketball team under the white coach for two seasons. When a new black coach arrives his senior year, Ray is suddenly talented enough to make the 22-man squad. The only problem with making a varsity team is that it brings on unasked-for responsibilities and treatments . . . and makes those barriers even worse.

What should Ray do when there are conflicts between his white friends and his newfound black friends? Or when some of his teammates see him as a detriment to the team?

Cord McKeithen
Baton Rouge, LA

The Brothers Story
by Katherine Sturtevant
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009, 275 pp., $16.99

Historical Fiction/Family/Growing Up
ISBN: 978-0-374-30992-3

A young boy faces love, sadness, and coming to terms with his own sexuality. Kit’s mother implores him to fill the “head of the house” duties after his father dies; these duties include providing the daily basic essentials during a difficult winter, which often requires him to fabricate, beg, and steal.

Kit and his twin brother Christy, born into extreme poverty in an Essex village, are close, but Kit’s love for his “simple” identical twin is often challenged. Is he his brother’s keeper? Kit both involves Christy in schemes and ploys and protects him from others taunting his ignorance.

Kit abandons his brother to find a new life in London, a place he believes is filled with jobs, money, and rich soil. He becomes an apprentice, but can he, in good conscience, continue to stay away from his codependent, suffering family?

Montika Allen-Atkinson
Junction City, KS

The Silver Blade by Sally Gardner
Dial Books, an imprint of Penguin, 2009, 362 pp., $17.99

Historical Fantasy, French Revolution, Romance
ISBN: 978-0-8037-3377-0

The Silver Blade , the sequel to The Red Necklace , is historical fantasy set during the French Revolution. It centers on Yann, a young gypsy with the power to move objects and read people’s minds, and Sido, the young daughter of an aristocrat.

After rescuing Sido from the evil Count Kalliovski, who wished to capture Sido for his own bride, Yann flees to England, making secret journeys back to France to smuggle out refugees. He and Sido fall in love, but she is again kidnapped. He needs all his courage and skill to rescue her a second time. Even then, the young lovers are not safe, for our hero learns his true identity. With this knowledge, how can Sido marry him? The horrors of the French Revolution make a dazzlingly vivid setting for a tale of high adventure that is also a touching love story.

June Newman-Graham
Baton Rouge, LA

Touch by Francine Prose
HarperTeen, 2009, 262 pp., $16.99

Friendship/Truth/Divorce
ISBN: 978-0-06-137517-0

High school freshman Maisie Willard has been through plenty already—her parents’ divorce, trying to adjust to new stepparents, and moving between households to decide where she feels most welcome.

When she returns to her father’s home, she’s reunited with her three best friends—three boys who’ve been best buddies with her as long as she can remember. But something’s changed. And soon, a touching incident with the boys in the back of a school bus becomes a communitywide issue, further shattering Maisie’s world. But, as the “truth” comes out, stories change, and even Maisie’s not sure what really went on.

Students will be able to identify with the ambiguity of perceptions—and defining what truth really is. Prose provides a realistic portrayal of a teen’s life made uneasy following her parents’ divorce, only to be escalated when rumors build about the incident on the bus.

Lori Atkins Goodson
Manhattan, KS