Crossing the Wire

Crossing the Wire by Will Hobbs is a really good book.  I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading contemporary fiction.   

Fifteen-year-old Victor Flores lives in central Mexico.  Victor is a farmer.  Since his father past away, he’s been taking care of his mother and five younger siblings.  His family’s survival depends on selling the corn he grows, but lately the price of corn has been dropping every year.  This year it dropped so low that there is no point in growing more corn than his family can eat.  Victor has an idea, though.  His best friend Rico has just left for the United States.  Rico has experienced men to travel with and coyote money to pay the smugglers who sneak illegals across the border.  He has everything Victor does not.  Victor has heard stories of people who travel across the border alone though, and he knows that if he wants his family to survive he’ll have to cross the border and find work in the U.S.

Scat

Scat by Carl Hiaasen is a wonderful book.  It’s hilarious and I would this book to anyone.

Bunny Starch is one of the most feared and detested biology teachers ever.  Mrs. Starch is Nick and Marta’s biology teacher, and she took their class on a field trip to Black Vine Swamp.  Not long after they got there, they smelt smoke, and discovered that a small fire had started at the edge of the swamp.  They quickly left for the buses, but Mrs.Starch stayed behind to retrieve an inhaler that a student had dropped.  It was the last time Nick and Marta saw their biology teacher.  There’s a message on Mrs. Starch’s answering machine and a letter written by her that both say she has taken leave because of a family emergency.  The problem is that no one has actually seen or heard from Mrs. Starch.  Nick and Marta are terrified that their classmate Duane, who everyone calls Smoke, has done something to her because he threatened her the day before she disappeared.  So they decide to take things into their own hands and figure out what happened to her.  Below is a video that talks about the book.

Flowers for Algernon

Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keys is a great book.  I would recommend it to anyone who loves to read science fiction. 

Charlie Gordon has an IQ of68.  Charlie wants to be smart, and has wanted to be smart all his life.  He tries really hard, but Charlie just can’t learn.  He even goes to night classes at Beekman college for retarded adults three times a week.  All of Charlie’s trying is about to pay off, though.  There’s an operation that has been proven to increase intelligence dramatically in animals, animals, and now scientists want to try it on a human.  The scientists give Charlie the operation.  Charlie is finally able to learn the way he has always wanted, too.  After a while though, Charlie learns the hard way that being smart can also mean being lonely.  Then, scientists notice that the animals that had the same operation as Charlie have regressed mentally.  They fear that the same thing will happen to Charlie.

The Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini is one of my favorite book series.  I would recommend this series to anyone who likes to read fantasy.  There are currently three books out in the four book series: Eragon, Eldest, and Brisnigr. The fourth book in the series is called Inheritance, and it is going to be released November 8, 2011.  I’ve been looking forward to its release for a really long time.  I think it’ll be a really great book, because I really enjoyed reading the first three books.  The series follows the story of Eragon, one of the very few living dragon riders, on his journey to defeat the evil King Galbatorx, the man who killed nearly all of the dragon riders when he came into power.  Below is a video of the author of the series discussing the first three books in the Inheritance Cycle.

All-in

All-in by Pete Hautman is a good book, and I would recommend it to anyone who likes to read good poker stories.

Denn Doyle makes his living by playing high-stakes Texas holdem.  He’s seventeen and it’s not even legal for him to gamble, but he doesn’t care and it doesn’t stop him.  Denn has a knack for finding and reading tells.   It’s earned him thousands of dollars and a lot of enemies, particularly Artie Kingston, who Denn one a nightclub off in a poker game months earlier. Things are going good for him, until his card dealing girlfriend sets him up in a poker game for ten-thousand-dollars, leaving him nearly flat broke.   Denn has one chance to make a comeback and that’s a million-dollar, winner-take-all tournament, held at Artie Kingston’s brand new casino.   There‘s only one problem though, and that’s the ten-thousand-dollar entry fee.  Denn tries to get the money by playing low-stake tournaments, but he quickly realizes that that will take too long.  He asks his best friend, Jimbo, for a loan, but is quickly shot down.   Soon, Denn’s out of options and sure he’s not going to get the money together in time.                                                                                                                                                                                

The Outsiders

The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton is an awesome book.  I love it and it's one of my favorites.  I would recommend it to anyone.

Ponyboy Curtis lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma.  In Tulsa, the rich Socs live on the West side of town, and the poor greasers live on the East side of town.  Socs jump greasers, wreck houses, and throw beer blasts.  Greasers steal, hold up gas stations, and have gang fights.  The Socs and the greasers don’t get along.  Ponyboy is a greaser, but he doesn’t do the things normal greasers do.  Instead, he brings home good grades and tries to stay out of trouble, because if he didn’t his brother would kill him.  One night, when Ponyboy and his best friend Johnny are out to late at the park a blue mustang pulls up and five Socs jump out.  That night, the Socs take things too far.  They jump Ponyboy and Johnny.  One of the Socs tries to drown Ponyboy.  So Johnny, in a desperate attempt to save his friend’s life, stabs the Soc with his switchblade knife.  The Soc dies, and the other Socs disappear the moment their friend is stabbed.  Ponyboy and Johnny are terrified that they’ll be charged with murder, so they do the only thing they think they can do, run.      

MASH

MASH by Richard Hooker is a great book.  It is one of my favorite books, and it’s hilarious.  There is both a movie and a TV series based off of it.  The book is about the lives of three fictional army doctors serving during the Korean War: Hawkeye Pierce, Duke Forrest, and Trapper John.  The characters in this book are combinations of people Hooker knew, met, worked with, or heard about.  The doctors in this story will do just about anything, and they can get away with just about everything.  They'll have a fake human sacrifice just so they can teach a man a lesson, they'll fake insanity just so they can spend a few days in Seoul, and they'll even organize a corrupt football game.  I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys watching the TV series M*A*S*H, and to anyone who likes to have a really good laugh.

Closer

 Closer the fourth installment in the Tunnel series, by Rodrick Gordon and Brian Williams, is very well written and nearly impossible to put down.  In my opinion, the series is better than Harry Potter, and will be even more popular after its movie is released. The suspense is there from the first page until the very last, and it just increases as the book goes on.  The suspense is the same with the other three books in the series (Tunnels, Deeper, and Freefall), too.  One of my favorite things about reading Closer, and the other three books, is that the moment you think you know what’s going to happen next, something completely unthinkable happens.  The book is action-packed, full of adventure, humor, and the unthinkable.
           
            The series revolves around Will Burrows, and his adventures in a mysterious world that he never knew existed, a world that Will was smuggled out of as a baby.  It’s a world where everything, even the humans living in it, are controlled.  Anyone who breaks the rules is put to death, or exiled to a place where death is almost certain.  Outsiders who discover this world, or even come close to finding it, are almost always put to death.  For Will, what had started out as a search for his father quickly turns into a matter of life, death, and survival.  I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading fantasy.  Below, is the book's trailer.

Hole in the Sky

Hole in the Sky by Pete Hautman is really interesting.  I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading science fiction.

In the year 2028, a Flu virus plagues the earth, and leaves only 38 million people alive worldwide.  Only one in two thousand people who contract the Flu live, the people who live are called Survivors.  The Flu can leave the survivors blind, deaf, and mentally impaired.  Ceej Kane lives in an abandoned hotel along the edge of the Grand Canyon, along with his uncle and sister Harryette.  Harryette is a Survivor.  One day Harryette, Uncle, and the father of Tim, Ceej’s best friend, disappear.  So Ceej and Tim set out to find them, while searching they are attacked by the Kinka.  The Kinka are a band of half-crazy Survivors who spread the Flu in an attempt to create more people like them.  Ceej and Tim quickly learn that the Kinka are behind the disappearances.   It is already too late to rescue Uncle, and Tim’s father, so the only one they can save now is Harryette, and they’re going to save her whether she wants to be saved or not.                                                                                                                                 

Among the Hidden

Among the Hidden by Margaret Haddix is a book that I think everyone should read at least once.  It’s the first book in Haddix’s Shadow Children series.

In Luke Garner’s world people are only allowed to have two children, all third children are hunted down and killed by the government.  Luke is a third child, also known as a shadow child. He has spent his whole life hiding on his family’s farm, and he’s never left the property.   Until a housing development was built near his family’s home, Luke was allowed to go outside, but now he’s confined to his room in the family’s attic.  One day, when Luke’s looking through the vents in the attic, he sees the face of a child in the widow of a home, a home that he knows already has two children.  Luke’s convinced he saw a shadow child, someone like him.  Unable to resist the idea of someone like him, Luke sneaks out of his house to investigate.  He discovers Jen.  Jen’s a third child, like Luke.  Jen wants to be free, and she willing to risk everything, even her life to become free.  Jen’s planning a rally at the capitol, a rally of shadow children.  Jen wants to show the government that there is nothing wrong with being a shadow child.  Jen wants Luke to go to the rally with her, but he’s afraid, because the rally could mean death for him and many others.

Traitor

Traitor by Andy McNab and Robert Rigby is a really good story.  I read it a while ago and really enjoyed it.  I would recommend it to anyone who likes to read adventure stories.

All Danny Watts wants to do is get a Regular Commissions Board scholarship, so he can go to a university, and then on to the Sandhurst Military Academy.  Things don’t go Danny’s way, though.  He gets denied the scholarship because the grandfather he’s never met, Fergus Watts, was a traitor to their country.  Angry, Danny decides to track down the man, with the assistance of his best friend Elena.  Everywhere they go no one’s heard from Fergus in years, or they’ve never heard of him at all. That doesn’t keep Danny from finding Fergus, though.  When Danny confronts his grandfather, the man’s grabs him and runs.  Quickly, Danny learns that he wasn’t the only person looking for his grandfather.  The other people want Fergus dead, and now they want Danny dead, too.  Danny’s grandfather says he innocent, and after a while Danny believes him.  Together, the pair of them tries to outsmart the people who are trying to kill them, and clear Fergus’s name.

Kill and Tell

Last night I read Kill and Tell, by Linda Howard.  I really enjoyed reading it.  I would recommend it to anyone who likes to read a good mystery.

Karen Whitlaw has just buried her mother, and can count the number of times she has seen her father on her hands.  So, she’s shocked when she receives a package containing an old notebook from him and she’s angry when she sees that the package is addressed to her dead mother.  Still angry, Karen throws the notebook in a box of her mother’s things without reading it, and has it put into storage along with the rest of her mother’s belongings.  She forgets all about the notebook, and still forgets weeks later when her father turns up murdered in the streets of New Orleans.  When Karen goes to New Orleans indentify her father’s body, she meets Marc Chastain, the detective who worked her father’s homicide.  From him, she learns that the police believe her father’s murder was just the result of street violence, and they‘ve already stopped working the case.  After burying her father, she returns home.

Upon her return, Karen discovers that her old house has been burned down, not long after someone breaks into her apartment, and then someone tries to run her over.  Karen can help but wonder think someone is trying to kill her, and wonder if it has anything to do with her father.  Terrified, she heads back to New Orleans and back to the detective, in the hope of stopping whatever was going on and of finding out what really happened to her father.