Beastly, by Alex Flinn

This adaptation of the Grimm fairy tale Beauty and the Beast is proof (once again)that fairy tales are not just for children. With due respect to Walt Disney, this story works much better as a young adult tale. The theme of a handsome but heartless male bewitched so that his exterior is as ugly as his personality is timeless. His inner transformation is a journey worth reading, and his final redemption through the love of a girl - satisfying. Alex Flinn throws enough twists into the classic tale to keep readers who know where the story is going entertained along the way. This is plain fun.

The cardturner, by Louis Sachar

How are we supposed to be partners? He can't see the cards and I don't know the rules! But pushed by his money-hungry parents, Alton becomes his blind Uncle Lester's cardturner - helping Uncle Lester play tournament bridge. Alton narrates the evolution of his relationship with Trapp (the Uncle Lester stuff is the 1st thing to go) as he becomes intrigued with Trapp, with the game of bridge, and especially with Toni Castenada - the pretty and shy girl whose link to Trapp is somehow tied to Trapp's fabled romantic history. Alton soon learns that things aren't always what you have been told, and appearances don't tell the whole story either.

Alton's not into drama. His self-depreciating sense of humor and his wry observations carry him through a summer full of life changing events in (almost) perfect control. His mother's money-hungry advice rings in his head - Don't screw it up, Alton. But there is more than money at stake, and Alton has his own priorities straight.

Chew : Taster's Choice, by John Layman (Graphic Novel)

Tony Chu is a cibopath, which means he gets psychic impressions from whatever he eats. Eating an apple, for example, gives him an impression of the exact tree it came from, the tree's location, the pesticides used on it, and the migrant workers who picked the apple. Eating a piece of meat gives him visions of terrified animals being led to the slaughterhouse and those visions have made him vegetarian. The only food he can eat in peace is beets - beets lead dull lives, apparently. Basically he is hungry all the time and reluctant to eat and bring on disturbing visions. His job as a cop gets tougher and less appetizing when he stops in a restaurant one day and the vegetable soup he orders brings on horrifying visions of 13 grisly murders committed by one of the kitchen help. He stops a mass murderer, but his explanation of just how he knew gets him transfered to Special Crimes Division where the boss is not afraid to exploit Tony's ability - and Tony's case load gets tough to swallow when he starts getting fed evidence from cold cases........

The reader better have a strong stomach as well as a taste for dark humor.

I am number four, by Pittacus Lore

There were nine children sent to Earth to escape the destruction of their planet Lorien by the evil Mogadorians. Now the Mogadorians are hunting the nine to kill them all, and three are already dead. Number Four knows they are coming for him next. But at 15, Number Four is sick of moving constantly, changing schools, changing names, never making friends or having a girlfriend. So when he settles into Paradise, Ohio, taking the name of John Smith, he refuses to stay anonymous as he has always done before. He makes friends, falls in love, and when the Mogadorians come for him, he fights. This is good fun, and if it doesn't always make perfect sense, well, that's easy to forgive in the adventure of it all.