We had our most recent Student Book Club meeting this passed Thursday and I am so disappointed to report, my 8th graders absolutely hated Sadie.
Granted, their reasoning was that they kept getting thrown off by the timeline jumping and were not particular fans of the dialogue style from the podcast. A few of the members agreed that for them, it would have been much better if the perspective had just remained with Sadie and the writing was “normal.” I respectfully disagree; I thought Sadie was amazing and truly lives up to the general hype. But to each, his/her own (and I’ll know better about skimming through books to check for dialogue construction from now on).
The way we’ve organized the club allows the kids to choose from a preselected collection of YA novels and they come together to make the monthly selection. This month, the students have chosen Scythe from the Arc of a Scythe series by Neal Shusterman. We’ve been coveting this one for a while and are super excited for a dystopia genre book to talk about. However, I always bring up new releases to share with the kids for future or individual reading. OF COURSE I snatched up Two Can Keep A Secret as soon as it was released, in anticipation to talk about with the kids. We read One of Us Is Lying for our second month selection and I’m pretty sure it still holds the honorary title of Club Favorite.
To say that this was a much anticipated follow-up book after McManus’ release of One of Us Is Lying…would be a drastic understatement. I bow down to you, KM. This was absolutely engrossing in the best way. I read it in one day and plan on lending it to my students from Book Club ASAP.
Ellery and Ezra Corcoran are 17-year-old twins, uprooted from their home in LA after their mother gets into a serious accident that lands her in rehab. They’re plunked down in Small Town Central Vermont, en route to living with their some-what estranged maternal grandmother. On the way to their new country dwelling, they stumble upon the first tragedy in a slew to come…
Malcolm Kelly is just trying to get through life as unscathed as possible…or as unscathed as one can get after the accusations and speculation surrounding his brother’s involvement in a brutal murder. In a town where everyone knows everyone else’s business and grudges run hot and deep, Malcolm begrudgingly thanks his lucky stars that his mom is newly married to the town big shot, somewhat shielding Malcolm from the unfair backlash he’s had to endure.
But when someone starts hinting at murderess things to come for the Homecoming Queen hopefuls on this year’s court (Ellery mysteriously included among them) in the form of threatening banners and gore covered dolls, tragedies from the past begin to resurface causing scrutiny, paranoia, and unpleasant memories to immerge with them.
With multiple mysteries vying to be solved and one of the queens disappearing, Ellery and Malcolm have to work together to stop a killer in his tracks and clear Malcolm’s brother’s name once and for all…
There are multiple mysteries that pop up in this book, all skin-crawling, heart-sinking, teeth-chatteringly intense. I can promise that they all come together in the most unanticipated of ways at the end – YOU WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED. Again, it can’t be said enough, Karen M. McManus is the straight up QUEEN of YA thrillers. Waiting for her third one like…
Hope you love it!
Happy & healthy reading!
Alexis
