The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

457 pages

"After the first wave, only darkness remains. After the second, only the lucky escape. And after the third, only the unlucky survive. After the fourth wave, only one rule applies: Trust no one.

Now it's the dawn of the fifth wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth's last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan may be Cassie's only hope for rescuing her brother--or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up." -Dust Jacket

This is an interesting story. The idea of aliens wiping out humans in waves is interesting. The first wave wipes out the electricity, the second is natural disasters, the third is a devastating virus and the fourth is infiltrating humanity. The fifth wave involves indoctrinating children and turning them into soldiers. They're definitely thorough in their takeover of earth. The story shifts point of views between Cassie, Evan, and Ben. It kept me up really late one night as I couldn't put it down until it was finished. I liked the writing style and the sarcasm.

This one comes with a big BUT though. These types of books are mostly for young adult readers and there is a ton of language, including 3 or 4 "F" words. It wasn't just an occasional word, it was pretty in-your-face at times. I hated that. I hate getting sucked into a story and having to wade through language because I want to see how it ends rather than not read it, which would have been the right choice. My kids asked me if it was a good book and I had to give them the answer that I hate because it justifies it: "Yes, but..." It's like a "do as I say, not as I do" thing as I try to encourage them to stop reading books if they have junk in them. So, good book but there is a huge asterisk in recommending it. I will probably read the other two books but reluctantly. The nice thing is that in a month all of the books will be out so I don't have to wait for them.

{Spoilers}
Cassie has survived and lost her parents. Her brother is taken away with other children to a "safe haven" called Camp Haven. Cassie spends the book trying to keep her promise to find her brother, Sammy, who's 5. Her high school crush, Ben Parrish, meanwhile is at Camp Haven where he recovers from the virus and then is trained by who he thinks are human soldiers to fight the enemy. His squad consists of children. The youngest is seven, until Sammy is put in his group. They're given special equipment that helps them determine who is infected and and who is healthy.

Evan helps Cassie recover after being shot in the knee. Turns out, Evan's the one who shot her and is the one who's been hunting her for a long time. He's a Silencer, an alien assassin. The alien was implanted in him when he was a baby and awakened during the first wave. The aliens don't have a physical form but are more like a conscious being. They've all downloaded themselves into the master computer when they left their planet and so Evan's alien was uploaded into his brain when he was in the womb. So, he's human and not human. He has all of Evan's memories of growing up and his family. Evan falls in love with Cassie and can't kill her. He chooses to help her and turn against his own race. Cassie figures out who he is and is torn between the desire to kill him and the fact that she loves him too.

Ben figures out what's going on when he's sent out on his first mission. His squad wears a visor that lights up people with a green or red dot. They're tasked with killing people who are green but the people who are green are actually the ones that haven't been implanted by the aliens. Ben and Ringer, a squad member, cut out their implants. They've realized after finding one of their sergeants shooting at them from the rooftop, that their implants can be used to kill them with the simple push of a button.

Ben decides to go back to Camp Haven and get Sammy ("Nugget") and then escape. Cassie is also on her way to Camp Haven to rescue Sammy. Evan has told her that Camp Haven is the aliens' main base and provides her with a way to get in and out. Of course that plan goes awry. Cassie cuts her hair so she can get away with looking a lot younger and she's picked up by a school bus and processed by the aliens. While being connected to an alien program called Wonderland, which maps a person's brain, she attacks the doctor and goes in search of Sammy. She and Ben find Sammy at about the same time and Evan shows up to help them. He gives them a way out and then tells Cassie that he's going to do something. He promises to find her. That something is blow up Camp Haven with the aliens' own bombs. Ben's team helps them escape the destruction but you don't know if Evan made it out.

Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys

378 pages

"Winter, 1945.

Four teenagers.

Four secrets.

Each one born of a different homeland; each one hunted, and haunted, by tragedy, lies...and war.

As thousands of desperate refugees flock to the coast in the midst of a Soviet advance, four paths converge, vying for passage aboard the Wilhelm Gustloff, a ship that promises safety and freedom.

Yet not all promises can be kept.

Inspired by the single greatest tragedy in maritime history, bestselling and award-winning author Reta Sepetys lifts the veil on a shockingly little-known casualty of World War II. An illuminating and life-affirming tale of heart and hope." -Dust Jacket

I read Between Shades of Gray (not to be confused with Fifty Shades of Gray which I haven't read) and I really liked it. It's a very sad, heartbreaking, yet beautifully written book, so when I saw this new one by the same author, I couldn't wait to read it. I also didn't know anything about the sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff and that it was a much bigger disaster than the Titanic or the Lusitania.

Because this is based on a true story, you know that the boat is going to sink. A Russian submarine shot 3 torpedoes at it on the same day it left port in Germany. It was a ship that was designed to carry around 1,500 people and there were almost 10,000 on board that day, nearly 5,000 of them children. So as you read this book and see the four main characters' lives converge, you know they are headed for disaster and the gripping part is that you don't know what will happen to these characters--will they be the survivors or the victims?

This book shifts point of view between Emilia, Joanna, Alfred and Florian. They are each from a different country and their lives converge early on for Emilia, Joanna and Florian and not until the ship for Alfred. Alfred is a young Nazi and has some very offensive views about those with disabilities and the groups that Hitler persecuted. He goes around chanting a song about all the groups of people that Hitler hated. Because he's weak, he persecutes people to make himself seem more important. I really like that he writes mental letters to a girl he likes that make him appear to be important and then it's contrasted with really how insignificant he is in real life. The shifting points of view was the only way to write this book and have it be effective, especially considering that each of these people has a secret and some tragedy that they are concealing. The chapters are short because of the shifting points of view.

I think this is a really great read for older kids, like 6th grade and up. There was no language that I can recall and just enough tragedy to teach/remind kids of how horrific WWII was without being graphic. These are all teenage and young adult characters. I really liked the ending, but won't spoil it!

Five Kingdoms: Death Weavers by Brandon Mull

502 pages

"Since arriving in the Outskirts, Cole and his friends have fought monsters, challenged knights, and battled rampaging robots. But none of that has prepared them for Necronum.

In this haunting kingdom, it's hard to tell the living from the dead, and secret pacts carry terrifying dangers. Within Necronum lies the echolands, a way station for the departed, where the living seldom venture.

Still separated from his power, Cole must cross to the echolands and rely on his instincts to help rescue his friends. With enemies closing in, Cole risks losing everything to find the one thing that might save them." -Dust Jacket

This is the 4th book in the Five Kingdoms series. I like that Brandon Mull thought outside the box a little for this book. Each of the books takes place in one of the five kingdoms and each kingdom is so different from the previous one. Necronum is no exception. There were lot of things I'd forgotten from the previous books (that's the problem with having to wait a year plus in between books and not wanting to re-read them!). There are a lot of characters in this series and I probably should have looked them all up online to refresh my memory, although I could remember the main ones. I think a young reader would get lost in this story and not be able to follow all the back and forth between the mortal world and the echolands. As an adult, I liked that it made me have to think and keep track of things more than most kids' books do.

At the end of the book Mull writes a note to the reader saying that he's going to slow down his writing pace a bit and the final book in this series will come out fall 2017. I don't really like having to wait that long but at the same time I think it will really help him write a great conclusion. I think this book sort of showed that he's been rushed with publishing dates and the story and editing have suffered because of it. I'm anxious for the sequel to the Fablehaven series and hopefully that book with get the same consideration. I'm willing to wait longer if the end result is better.

{Spoilers}
Here is perhaps one of my favorite parts of this book and also one of the most disappointing: in what I thought was a genius move, Mull has Cole meet two of my favorite characters from the Beyonders series in the Hall of Glory--Drake and Ferrin. I cried at the end of the last Beyonders book because Mull killed off some favorite characters which I love and hate. To bring them back in this series as echoes was so cool...and then they don't get to do anything! Cole meets them and then they all split up and Cole doesn't go with Drake or Ferrin so the reader doesn't get to read more of them until Cole rescues them from prison and then that's it. I really wish that Drake and Ferrin would have gone with Cole. I think that was a huge mistake on Mull's part. For someone who hasn't read Beyonders they would have been two additional, interesting characters, but for someone who has, it would have been like a little treat within the story.

It'll be interesting to see how Cole uses his newly healed powers to defeat the torivors and the king in the final book. I think I might have to re-read the series before then so that I can remember everything that happened in the first four books. I read this one really fast because I'm really anxious to start my next book! I need a cathartic cry and I think it'll provide one.