In the Michael Vey series, book four, Storm of Lightning, the resistance movement against the Elgen has been compromised. Micheal must prevent the Elgen from taking over the small island nation of Tuvalu. Hatch, the antagonist, is working to take over the world and wants to use Tuvalu as his base of operations. Since the island has no army and only a few police to defend themselves the island people are nearly helpless. Hatch plans on using his fleet of battleships to initiate a naval invasion of Tuvalu and quickly rid the island of the police force that is protecting it. Michael and his friends work on a plan to stop the naval invasion and destroy the boats before they make landfall. This book has some easily predictable moments, but is still very interesting and fun to read. My favorite part is when Michael and his friends nearly fail to accomplish one of the important parts of a plan they had made together, I would highly recommend this book and series to anyone who is into science fiction and fantasy because this book combines the two very well. However, make sure to read the first 3 books in the series first so this book is easier to follow and understand.

Reviewer Grade: 9

The 4th book of the Michael Vey series begins with Michael and his friends returning to a secret base. The reason they have returned is because they are preparing to go find and rescue a girl named Jade Dragon. She had been captured by the antagonist Dr. Hatch. The reason she was held captive is she is considered a genius and is able to solve problems the Elgen have had for many years. The part of this book I liked the most was when one of the plans that Michael and his friends come up with goes well. This is unexpected because most of the time his plans go very wrong. This book was not very predictable, which I enjoyed. There is no part of this book I would say I didn’t enjoy. This book is definitely worth reading and is slightly better than the 3rd book in this series. Overall this entire series is worth reading because the further into the series you go the better the books get.

Reviewer Grade: 9

In the book, Battle of the Ampere, Michael, the protagonist, finds himself attempting to rescue his friends as he is the only one not being held captive by the Elgen. This book is good but predictable at times. Hatch, the antagonist, has captured the Elgen fleet and is beginning his quest for world domination.The part I liked the most was when Michael’s plan fails and he comes up with a new and better plan. The thing I liked the least is how predictable it is. This book is one of seven books in this series, and it was not the best in the series. However, this book is still worth reading and the entire series is definitely worth reading and very good.

Reviewer Grade:9

In the 4th book of this series Hal find himself helping the King of another country across the sea. Hal travels to this country by boat and it takes him about a week. One of Hal's rivals, Tursgud, is also in the area. By the time Hal arrives, Tursgud has raided a village and captured 12 villagers. Tursgud goal is to sell the captured villagers as slaves. Hal decides the Brotherband should go rescue the villagers. I enjoyed reading this book and this series.

Throughout the book I was kept guessing what would happen next. I was never sure about what Hal would do. My favorite part of the book is when one of the Brotherband's plan completely fails and they have to come up with a completely new plan. There were no parts of this book I did not like. I would not recommend reading this book before reading the previous books in the series as you may likely have trouble understanding the characters and the situations they are in. However, this entire series is excellent and worth reading all of the books in the series. I would recommend this book series to anyone who enjoyed reading the Ranger's Apprentice by the same author, John Flanagan. This series is in the same time period and the same world as the Ranger's Apprentice.

Reviewer Grade: 9

Definitely among my favorite books of the year. Beautifully written in alternating points of view, each woman's story is absolutely compelling, enraging, and heartbreaking. There was a passage toward the end of the novel where I found I actually was holding my breath.

This is the type of book that makes you understand the power of words and stories and how important they are, on so many levels - from Isra reading to escape her suffocating life, to Deya for whom books mean freedom and education and choice, to the reader who is ultimately changed by the experience of their story.

This book is going to stay with me for quite a while - definitely an author to keep on my radar!!!

This is a personal favorite series of mine, it is a very interesting, very fun book. Since it is the introduction to a 12 book series, at times it can feel a little boring, but once you get into it, it's the best series ever. Comparing it to other novels it feels very similar to the Percy Jackson series, in that the writing style is somewhat similar. This book is a must read for any teenager or pre-teen.

Artemis Fowl is an interesting book, although it deals with a concept, I frankly thought stupid, (fairies and leprechauns) it does so in a fun and well put together way. This is only one in a series of eight fiction books and starts very well as an introduction to the series. What I had a problem with, was this book felt very insincere in the fact that I never really cared about the characters. All in all I think it was an alright book and definitely worth reading for a pre-teen or young adult.

To Kill a Mockingbird is a well thought out, very deep and well executed book. Although it contains some very strong language, I'd say this is a must read for any teenager. Set during the time of the depression, this book deals with many political issues such as racism while also managing to teach very important lessons along the way. The complicated sentence structure in the book, as well as the vocabulary serve to make it a very fun and chalenging read. In my opinion this book is truly one of the best written in history.

One thing that was made clear to me when I read The Elfstones of Shannara was that this trilogy (that started with The Sword of Shannara ) didn’t follow the same characters from book to book, per se. Sure, there were character like Allanon the Druid who managed to span all three volumes, but overall I didn’t find that I needed to have read the previous book in the trilogy to understand what was going on in the story. This was quite beneficial when I started reading The Wishsong of Shannara, as it quickly grew to be my favorite in the series so far.

While I had high hopes for the “main quest” of this book, the fact that it’s put into side-story status almost from the beginning was a little frustrating. Don’t make me follow the journey of the character who needs to grow the most! Show me the thrilling adventures of a magical girl and her Highlander and druid escorts. Regardless, I did find Jair’s journey to be a bit more interesting once it was clear that’s who we were following through the majority of the book. Sure, we touched back with Brin occasionally, and her adventures were neat, too—just not nearly as interesting as Jair’s ended up being.

I have previously complained that The Sword of Shannara seemed like a bit of a Lord of the Rings knockoff. Additionally, The Wishsong of Shannara does have some similarities to The Two Towers. Not necessarily being tied to an overarching story arc did help to make this book quite interesting in terms of what minor characters could be developed to advance the story. This is on top of the excellent growth of both Ohmsfords as they learn the true power of the magic that lies within them. If you’re interested in any of the original Shannara books, I’d suggest you give this one a read first.

A relatively original high fantasy, and my favorite of the Shannara trilogy, I give The Wishsong of Shannara 4.5 stars out of 5.

Candide by Voltaire is an interesting book about a man who believes everything that happens will be for the good of man (perverted optimism) even though he is faced with incredible suffering. I read Candide with my European Literature class and I found it a very good book to demonstrate perverted optimism and satire. Voltaire uses satire as an effective device to show the horrors of the world at his time. While Candide is mostly based in truth, it has many fictional ideas such as a country called Westphalia and the mythical El Dorado. Overall, I really enjoyed this book even though it is very weird, it still had an interesting use of language and story line.