X-Ray Reads - Look Before You Read

Old Kingdom #3. Author: Garth Nix. Summary: Only Lirael, newly come into her inheritance as the Abhorsen-in-Waiting, has any chance of stopping the Destroyer. She and her companions — Sam, the Disreputable Dog, and Mogget — have to take that chance. For the Destroyer is the enemy of all Life, and it must be stopped, though Lirael does not know how. To make matters worse, Sam’s best friend, Nick, is helping the Destroyer, as a...

Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy #2. Author: Douglas Adams. Summary: Arthur Dent and his comrades are facing death at the hands of the Vogons, and their only help right now is a grumpy old ghost. On the plus side, there’s a good chance of tea later. As usual, the motley band of space-travelers are riding the flow, trying to stay ahead of annihilation, with a few extra efforts at figuring out what’s going on in Zaphod’s dual-brain. By thi...

Temeraire #4. Author: Naomi Novak. Summary: Tragedy has struck His Majesty’s Aerial Corps, whose magnificent fleet of fighting dragons and their human captains valiantly defend England’s shores against the encroaching armies of Napoleon Bonaparte. An epidemic of unknown origin and no known cure is decimating the noble dragons’ ranks–forcing the hopelessly stricken into quarantine. Now only Temeraire and a pack of newly recruited dragons remain...

The Memory Chronicles #1. Author: Lenore Appelhans. Summary: Felicia Ward is dead. What’s more, she’s tired of the afterlife – a blank, white place of cells where she and the other dead girls of her age spend their time reliving memories of their lives, over and over. Something’s wrong, for when one girl vanishes the others can’t remember her existence – so she’s ready to believe it when a mysterious rescuer steps through the wall and takes he...

Author: Kelly Barnhill. Summary: Every year, the people of the Protectorate leave a baby as an offering to the witch who lives in the forest. They hope this sacrifice will keep her from terrorizing their town. But the witch in the forest, Xan, is kind and gentle. She shares her home with a wise Swamp Monster named Glerk and a Perfectly Tiny Dragon, Fyrian. Xan rescues the abandoned children and deliver them to welcoming families on the other s...

Beka Cooper #2. Author: Tamora Pierce. Summary: Beka Cooper is no longer a Puppy. She’s a Dog now – a full-fledged member of the Provost’s Guard, which keeps the peace in Corus’s streets. Even her magic isn’t very useful when unrest comes to Tortall’s capital in the form of counterfeit coins, which turn up in shops all over the city. Merchants raise prices to cover their losses, and with winter coming on, hi...

Author: Elizabeth Scott. Summary:  Once upon a time, I was a little girl who disappeared. Once upon a time, my name was not Alice. Once upon a time, I didn’t know how lucky I was. When Alice was ten, Ray took her away from her family, her friends — her life. She learned to give up all power, to endure all pain. She waited for the nightmare to be over. Now Alice is fifteen and Ray still has her, but he speaks more and more of her de...

Unwind #1. Author: Neal Shusterman. Summary: Connor, Risa, and Lev are running for their lives. The Second Civil War was fought over reproductive rights. The chilling resolution: Life is inviolable from the moment of conception until age thirteen. Between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, however, parents can have their child “unwound,” whereby all of the child’s organs are transplanted into different donors, so life doesn&#...

Universe of Xuya. Author: Aliette de Bodard. Summary: Welcome to the Scattered Pearls Belt, a collection of ring habitats and orbitals ruled by exiled human scholars and powerful families, and held together by living mindships who carry people and freight between the stars. In this fluid society, human and mindship avatars mingle in corridors and in function rooms, and physical and virtual realities overlap, the appareance of environments easi...

Author: Marieke Nijkamp. Summary: 10:00 a.m. The principal of Opportunity High School finishes her speech, welcoming the entire student body to a new semester and encouraging them to excel and achieve. 10:02 a.m. The students get up to leave the auditorium for their next class. 10:03 a.m. The auditorium doors won’t open. 10:05 a.m. Someone starts shooting. Told from four different perspectives over the span of fifty-four harrowing minute...