Perry's Killer Playlist by Joe Schreiber

Perry's life is going great.  He got him into Columbia, he has an amazing older girlfriend, and his band is going on a European tour.  But in Italy Perry meets up with Gobi, the Lithuanian exchange student who lived with his family last year who actually turned out to be an assassin.  Now Perry is once again dodging bullets and on the run as Gobi tries to fulfill her latest mission.

I didn't realize that this was a sequel to Au Revior, Crazy European Chick, which I haven't read.  I was getting annoyed that there kept being references to what happened last summer.  Why wouldn't he tell me what happened last summer?  Was this a sequel or something?  Yes, yes it was.  So reading the first book would have been helpful, although it turned out, not necessary.

This was action-packed and fast moving.  Lots of sexy girls, lots of guns, lots of explosions, lots of high-speed car chases.  It was also pretty short and simple, so I think it would make a great high-low read for reluctant high school readers.  And there's definite boy appeal.

Not a whole lot else to say really.  A fun quick read with lots of action.

Perry's Killer Playlist comes out November 6, 2012.

The First Part Last by Angela Johnson

Bobby is 16 and a father.  He is the soul guardian of his brand new daughter, Feather.  Bobby loves Feather so much it scares him.  But his love for her doesn't change the fact that he still  a kid that wants to be cared for himself and is completely overwhelmed by Feather's care.

The First Part Last is a very short book.  It's a novella, almost, a little over 100 pages.  I read it about an hour.  It's written on a middle school level.  The language is simple and straight forward, but beautiful in its simplicity.  Angela Johnson said a lot more in 131 pages than a lot of other authors say in 400.  It makes me think some other author's are in desperate need of an editor.  I think this has a lot of high school appeal as well.  It's easy to read, but high interest. 

The First Part Last is unique in several ways.  First, there aren't a whole lot teenage pregnancy books that focus on the father, and that focus on the father actually caring for the child after it's born.  Bobby and his girlfriend Nia are from middle class families, also not seen as much in teenage pregnancy stories.  Bobby and Nia, even after they know about the pregnancy, continue their relationship and clearly care about each other very much.  That in particular I was struck by.  Bobby and Nia had a very gentle, caring relationship.  Most of the books about teenage pregnancy I've read the relationship is bad, or falls apart.  In this book, Bobby and Nia love each other, do something super stupid they know was super stupid, and then they deal with it and continue to love each other, and getting married never comes up.  Amazing.

Bobby's reaction to being a single father who's still in high school was realistically torn.  He loves his baby.  He's actually afraid of how much he loves her, and of how much Feather needs him and depends on him.  He wants to do what's best for her, care for her and make her happy.  But that doesn't change the fact that he's 16, and wants to play basketball with his friends, and hang out, and sleep through the night, and go to school without having to worry.  The portrayal of Bobby's emotions was heartfelt and painful.

There were still some flaws in the story.  Spoilers ahead.

Girl, Stolen by April Henry

No connection to Girl, Interrupted.

Griffin was only thinking of how proud his father would be when he stole the fancy Escalade from the mall parking lot. Unfortunately for him, he didn't realize there was someone sleeping in the back. Now Griffin doesn't know what to do. He only meant to take a car, not kidnap a girl. The girl, Cheyenne, turns out not to only have pneumonia, but is blind. Griffin's father plans to get money from Cheyenne's father to give her back safely, but Griffin is beginning to wonder if giving Cheyenne back is part of the plan at all.

So I got all judgy on this early on because the back cover was so melodramatic. "How will Cheyenne survive this nightmare? She's not only sick - she's BLIND!" And then the beginning seemed so far-fetched. When the kid realized there was someone in the back of the car, and that she was blind, wouldn't he just bail? But as it went along I bought in more to the "in over your head" place it was going to and how one bad decision forces a whole bunch of other really bad decisions.

The Suburb Beyond the Stars by M.T. Anderson

The Norumbegans and the Thussar were at war for many years before deciding there was a more civilized way to settle their territory dispute: play a game. Each race chooses a human to represent them in the Game, a kind of labyrinth. The winner of the Game creates a new labyrinth for the next players. In the first of this series, The Game of Sunken Places, Brian and Gregory have been chosen to participate in the Game that Gregory's cousin, Prudence, has created. Brian was representing the Numrumbegans and Gregory was representing the Thussar and the boys worked out that they really, really wanted the Norumbegans to win. What with the Thussar being kind of really evil.

Now, Brian and Gregory are hard at work creating the next round of the Game, when an alien tries to kill Brian. Something seems to have gone wrong. The Thussar have become tired of the Game, and seem to be going for straight invasion. But sneakily. Brian and Gregory try to contact Prudence to find out what's going on, but Prudence has disappeared without a trace. The boys head back to Vermont to search for her, and find that the invasion is already well underway.

This was not quite my cup of tea. I have not actually read The Game of Sunken Places, and maybe that would have helped. There was enough explanation to get a pretty good idea of what had happened in the first book, but perhaps I would have understood the characters better. As it was, Brian seemed like an indecisive wimp and Gregory was an attention seeking, whinny, pain in the behind. My biggest issue with the book was that the writing seemed kind of...amateur. It was choppy, dragging in some places, speeding ahead in others, and the boy's dialogue was awkward and unrealistic. Reading this book and comparing it to Octavian Nothing is a considerable contrast, although they were obviously written for very different audiences.

However, this would an excellent choice for middle school boys. It has action, adventure, quests, war, aliens doing gross things, and boy heroes. It would also be a good high-low choice for a high school boy reading at a middle school level. It's quite short and zips right along, ending on a cliff hanger so clearly another book is coming.