The Last Echo

May 1, 2012

Gr 9 Up-This entry in the series stands on its own. Seventeen-year-old Violet has the ability to feel "echoes," sensations that help her find dead bodies and killers, and she is part of a special team of psychic teens working on high-profile projects for the police. Its latest case involves women who are being murdered by the "collector," a serial killer who attacks victims and dresses them as if they were going on dates. The hunt for him places Violet in some tense situations. In a separate matter, she encounters James Nua, a man with strong echoes from murdering his girlfriend and children. When they make eye contact, he recognizes something about her that is key to the rest of the novel. Members of her team can divine facts from objects, talk to ghosts, and see the future, and they have successfully located bodies of missing persons and solved difficult mysteries, and Violet is grateful to have found a group of people with whom she doesn't feel like an outcast. However, Rafe, a brooding guy with secrets, confuses her by acting hot and cold toward her; when they come into physical contact they have some kind of energy that shocks them both. Do her complicated feelings about him mean that she is betraying her loyal boyfriend? The suspenseful ending will have readers tucking under blankets and imagining horror-movie scenarios. Tell them not to read this one right before bed.-Jessica Lorentz Smith, Bend Senior High School, OR

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