Sophomore Caroline Boerth recommends: “Pet Sematary” by Stephen King (Scribner).
“It’s about this family who moves to Maine, and they find a pet cemetery with all the dead pets from the town, and strange things happen,” Boerth said. “I like the constant suspense of the book and how you really never know what’s going to happen. There are so many plot twists.”
Junior Giana Gliko recommends: “On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness” by Andrew Peterson (Waterbrook).
“It’s about this family, and they have three kids, the Agape family. They live in this fantasy world that’s under occupation by these evil people who are ruling. The first book is very much the set up to the rest of the conflict that’s in the rest of the books, where the kids find out that they’re royalty, and they go through this series of adventures throughout the book that are sort of their own fault, and sometimes not. But all of it serves to break down the sheltered life that they’ve been living and makes them realize that there’s a world that’s a lot bigger than them, and they learn a whole lot,” Gliko said. “I really liked the theme, so I think that was the biggest thing for me. There’s sacrifice and family, love and adventure, and all of that.”
Sophomore Kay Liberi recommends: “All the Light We Cannot See” by Anthony Doerr (Scribner).
“It’s about this young girl who is blind, and her name is Marie Leblanc. She’s French. It takes place during World War II, and she has to take refuge in her uncle’s house in Saint Marlowe. It’s her story, but it’s also the story of Werner, and he’s this really bright German boy who is accepted into this big-time military school. They have their separate stories, but eventually they end up meeting, and it’s just a really great story,” Liberi said. “I really liked the characters. I thought they were really well written, especially Werner, but I also thought it had a really good message, and it really resonated with me. It was like knowing when to stand up to authority and knowing when to protect your family members and the people you love.”
I recommend: “youthjuice” by E. K. Sathue (Soho Press).
This book is a horror that follows Sophia Bannion as she starts her new job at HEBE, a beauty company in New York. She’s obsessed with the idea of not aging, and she’s been trying to break her awful nail-biting habit. As she climbs the ranks at her new company, a 30-year-old new hire among seas of 20 freshly hired interns, she’s asked by her boss to test a mysterious moisturizer and take notes about its performance in a special journal. Follow her story as she goes on to realize the dark secret of HEBE’s products.
