JACK: SECRET VENGEANCE

In 1983, 15-year-old Jack feels compelled to seek revenge against Carson Tolliver, BMOC at his Johnson, N.J., high school, when Tolliver tries to force himself on Jack’s best friend Weezy and then spreads rumors that earn her the nickname “Easy Weezy.” Weezy won’t go back to school while she’s the subject of gossip, so to start tongues wagging in a different direction, Jack begins secretly pranking Tolliver by rigging things to jump out of his locker. “Operation Tolliver” is a great success, but Jack doesn’t understand the degree to which Tolliver is disturbed by his jokes. Classmates from an insular, rural community in the Pine Barrens add a supernatural twist with their talk of “talents” and visions. As Jack learns secrets about his own past and a mystery unfolds, he does his best to do the right thing. Wilson’s final YA adventure offering a peep into the teen years of Repairman Jack, star of 14 adult novels (with two more on the way), is not as high-stakes as the previous two, and some of the sequencing among the titles and the trilogy feels off. Fans, teen and adult, will be in heaven; others should definitely start at the beginning with Jack: Secret Histories (2008). (Thriller. 12 & up)