I have just finished two incredible books that are vastly different. The first one is Divergent by Veronica Roth. It is the first of a dystopian trilogy, we are introduced to Beatrice. She is Abnegation one of 5 factions that mankind must choose from in the future. Her faction is dedicated to selflessness, although she has a hard time being selfless. On her aptitude test she is told that she is Divergent, a dangerous thing to be. She is told to never tell anyone what she is. On her 16th birthday she chooses to join the Dauntless faction, which honours bravery. Here she takes a new name, Tris, and falls in love with her instructor. This is a great book if you love dystopian fiction! I found it very hard to put down once Tris switched factions, train jumping and all sots of daredevil stunts made my heart jump more than a little and I couldn't wait to find out what being divergent really meant.
The second book that I just finished was a heartbreaking story of Ambrose in Word Nerd. At the beginning of the book Ambrose is nearly killed by bullies when they slip a peanut into his sandwich as he is allergic. His overprotective mother then pulls him out of school and he does correspondence. This is fun for him for about 2 weeks and then he convinces his neighbor upstairs, who has recently been let out of prison, that they should join a Scrabble club. This book was excellent to read as a parent. I hope that I am not as overprotective as Ambrose' mother but then again I would probably not give my son a neon pink fanny pack to hold his Epi pen in. I really couldn't help but love the geeky unfiltered humor of Ambrose and have sympathy towards him when it came to his mother. I think that this is an excellent read and should be part of every school curriculum.

Skinned

Lia Khan had the perfect life, up until she died. Her parents then downloaded her into a new body. She will never die and never feel pain again. The downside; her friends hate her, her boyfriend can't stand to touch her and her own sister rejects her. She slowly learns to accept who she really is and finds new friends and new ways to experience the life that she now has. This story is a coming age story that will make the reader examine what it is that truly makes us who we are. Are we just a collection of memories and experiences or something else entirely? This is the first in a trilogy and I am quite interested to see what else happens to Lia in her new life.

I Am Number Four

They are watching you. Meet John Smith, he is not from around here, actually he is from a totally different planet. He and nine other children escaped the devastation of their home world, Lorien. They are still on the run from the Mogadorians, who are set on destroying the Lorien race along with the human race. This book grabs from the beginning and really doesn't let go until the end. This has an excellent environmental message in it as well. I can't wait till the sequel The Power of Six.

Rot & Ruin

I just finished reading an amazing YA book called Rot & Ruin by Jonathan Maberry. This book was very thought provoking and really brought some cool ideas to light! It is a dystopic fiction involving zombies. The main character is the brother of a "zom killer" although he prefers to call himself a closure specialist. The book goes into the idea of challenging preconcieved notions about people and the main character,Benny Imura, learns some very hard and valuable lessons about family and about hero worship. In this book it is not everything is as it seems, rather don't judge a book by its cover! I started reading this book with the thought that "it's a zombie book, I am probably not going to really enjoy it" I figured that the first time someone ate a brain I was putting it down and starting something else! But it was a very fast paced book and wonderfully action packed without being typical zombie genre. Instead of the zoms being mindless braineaters they introduce the idea as a disease or genetic mutation(not sure which, jury is still out) and that these zoms were once someone's sister, grandfather or parent. This is an excellent read. Pleasantly surprised by it and I do believe there is a sequel!

Welcome

Hey there. This is the first blog from the Donalda Library! I would like to invite people to share book reviews and if there is anything interesting out there. Hope that we will get some ineresting books being shared!