Pages will turn right up to the cliffhanger.
This third in a series of five novellas that follow one storyline adds white teen Colin to the list of reluctant participants in the Contest.
Colin’s family has serious financial problems. Their hardware store appears to be failing, and Colin’s courageous transgender sister needs the surgery that will make her fully female. Colin agrees to enter the contest run by the mysterious online “Benefactor,” hoping to win $10 million by completing 10 tasks before the other contestants. Colin realizes quite soon that the Benefactor appears to be using the young, desperate contestants to pull off some kind of criminal scheme. He teams with the fourth contestant to outwit the Benefactor, but both find themselves caught up in events and propelled toward the final tasks before they can do so. Clearly, the fourth and fifth books in the series will advance and conclude the story, but the first three books leave readers hanging, ready for the next installment. A great choice for reluctant readers, this book, in presenting the transgender story, also delves into advocacy for equality. Colin tumbles to the scheme earliest of the first three contestants but knows he’s trapped unless they all unite to fight back.
Pages will turn right up to the cliffhanger. (Thriller. 12-18)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4677-7508-3
Page Count: 104
Publisher: Darby Creek
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2015
A chilling and engaging thriller.
A gamer is forced into the deadliest challenge she will ever engage in.
When the first anonymous message comes through her phone, Crystal thinks she is being trolled again, but she soon realizes that her sister has indeed been kidnapped and is being held hostage, while the person who took her forces Crystal into playing a game of increasingly bizarre and violent tasks with a 24-hour time limit. Even though she and her sister seem to be at the center of it all, Crystal’s best friends and esports teammates start to fall victim when her tormentor makes her choose between their lives and her sister’s. As the hours pass, Crystal uses her gaming instincts to discover who is behind it all and why she and her friends are being targeted. She must succeed before her sister dies—and her own secret is unveiled. Urban’s novel doesn’t pull punches as readers follow a thrilling cat-and-mouse game between Crystal and an anonymous figure. A few predictable twists don’t ruin the overall experience, as its strongest feature is Crystal’s rich and complex relationships with her violent, alcoholic father; her friends; and her sister and the ways they intertwine with her own past mistakes and the secrets she and her friends are keeping. Crystal is assumed White; there is some racial diversity in the supporting cast.
A chilling and engaging thriller. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-79719-3
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Wednesday Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
A well-crafted, fantastical thriller.
Thirteen guests. Two imposters. Two directives. Three days. One murder.
When a mysterious woman approaches high schoolers Ruby and Wren while they’re working at Ye Olde Falafel Shoppe at the local Renaissance festival, her offer seems too good to be true. Wannabe starlet Wren is thrilled by the intrigue, but sober Ruby is cautious. Their task seems simple: impersonate the woman’s absent granddaughters at a dinner party at the infamous Hegemony Manor in exchange for $2,000 each. But events quickly spiral out of control when the Hegemony family matriarch collapses and the girls are thrown into a game that involves fighting for their lives in a world where nothing is as it seems and secrets and lies abound. This novel offers a compelling take on the classic locked-room mystery. The plot unfolds at a measured pace, and well-developed clues and red herrings keep readers guessing until the very end. Moments of levity and tenderness balance out scenes of high emotional tensions and darkness, and Henning’s command of figurative and situationally informal language is masterful. Although the characters feel a bit flat at times—their innermost thoughts and motivations occasionally obscured by the narrative—and the romances sometimes feel like an afterthought, it’s easy to become invested in their struggles as they come together to unravel the web of truths and lies. Ruby and Wren are cued white; there’s some racial diversity in the supporting cast.
A well-crafted, fantastical thriller. (Supernatural thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2024
ISBN: 9781250841063
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Tor Teen
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024
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