Teen Review by Abdullah. . .Erratum by Walter Sorrells

Jessica Sternhagen always knew she was different. She liked things that were. . .just plain different from everything that other people liked. It all started with eleven-year old Jessica's love for books, she read all the books that she could get her hands on. Which basically meant she was tons smarter than other kids.

Jessica lives in Alsberg, Minnesota - aka, the most boring town in the U.S. so it was very typical for her to walk in to a new bookstore that she's never seen before. But something is wrong with the store, the owners talk in old fashioned english, their eyes have weird flickering lights in them, and to top it off they say they have book for her titled Her Lif. At first Jessica thinks its a printers mistake, or erratum, shouldn't it be titled Her Life? All these things are just the beginning of a series of bizarre happenings. Including a narrowly escaped murder, her life getting switched around with her best friend Dale's, and saving the universe.

As master mystery writer Walter Sorrels tells the story of Jessica and "Her Life", he'll have you waiting to turn the page to see what Jessica does next. Mr. Sorrells is also the author of many other award-winning mysteries that have been given the thumbs-up by some of the best critics. Although the cover and title might seem boring, Erratum is extremely fast-paced and compelling for anyone looking for a good read.

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Thanks, Abdullah, for the review! Always appreciated. If you want to read something as fast-faced as Erratum, try one of these:

Raven's Gate by Anthony Horowitz

The Alchemyst by Michael Scott

The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness

Sneaky book fanatics

My mom, brother, and I read pretty much the same books. My brother lives in my apartment complex and likes to sneak into my apartment and steal my books (and food, of course) when I'm not there. He usually leaves food wrappers or plates sitting around, so of course I know he's been there. He's not the stealthiest person I know.

My mom is sneaky in a different way. She recently read the Twilight series and loved it. Yay! But then I had her read The Hunger Games and she just about had a fit when she found out there is a sequel that won't be out until September. [ insert maniacal laughter here ] She hates to read series that aren't completed because she hates having to wait for the next book to come out.

I am a sneaky daughter because I tricked her into reading Patrick Ness' The Knife of Never Letting Go, knowing all the while that there is a sequel that has not yet been published. The book is incredible, one you don't want to put down, not even to eat or take a shower, so she loved it as much as I did.

But then she got sneaky. Patrick Ness, the author of The Knife of Never Letting Go, lives in England, so the book comes out first in the UK and is published months later in the U.S. The sequel, The Ask and the Answer is due to be published September 8, 2009.

I went over to her house yesterday and guess what she had? That's right. A UK copy of The Ask and the Answer. She'd ordered it through Amazon.co.uk and was very smug about it, too!

But I did what any good, sneaky daughter would do. I grabbed it and took it home with me. So now I am happily reading it and will know what happens in the story before she does. This is where I give a happy little sigh. =)

The Ninja Reviews. . .The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness

What if you lived in a small town where you could hear the thoughts of every single living soul (man, dog, bird, squirrel) and they could hear yours?

This is how Todd Hewitt has grown up. In Prentisstown all 147 residents are male and every single one can hear each other's thoughts, which they call Noise, all the time. An individual's Noise can be picked out of the mass of thoughts, but there are also lies that are hard to tell apart from true thoughts.

Todd is the only boy left in this all-male town. When he turns 13, which is fast approaching, he will become a man. But there is something strange about becoming a man in Prentisstown, only Todd doesn't know what it is.

On a trek out to the nearby swamp to pick apples, Todd discovers a place of utter silence that should not exist. Why is there quiet when there shouldn't be? And what are the men of Prentisstown not telling him? The answer to these questions begins when Todd is forced to run from the place he grew up.

I absolutely loved this book. It grabbed my attention from page one and held it throughout. I immediately liked Todd and his loyal dog, Manchee. As Todd ran from Prentisstown, I found myself incredibly nervous, afraid for his safety.

The book is written in a somewhat mild form of dialect, meaning that some words are spelled out the way Todd pronounces them. Some people might not like this, but I didn't have any problem at all because it wasn't every single word. There is also a sense of stream-of-consciousness that really helps illustrate Todd's personality and his distress. Again, some readers may not like this. The ending is also a HUGE cliffhanger, which may irritate some readers. The book is actually titled The Knife of Never Letting (Chaos Walking, Book One), so a cliffhanger ending is really to be expected since there will be a sequel.

Recommended for mature or older teens because of violence and some language.