The Lying Game
by Sara Shepard

Emma’s had a pretty crappy life--she was abandoned by her mother at a young age and has been floating around foster homes ever since. One day, Emma’s deadbeat foster brother shows her a video of a girl being strangled. The girl looks exactly like Emma. After a little bit of research, Emma finds the other girl’s Facebook page (a girl named Sutton) and sends her a message hoping that they can meet up sometime. Sutton replies telling her to meet the next day and not to tell anyone who you are until we talk. Emma arrives at the designated meeting spot and while she is waiting, someone comes up from behind, blindfolds her, and roughly drags her away. When the blindfold is removed, it is revealed that Sutton’s friends have just pulled a prank on the girl they mistakenly think to be Sutton. She is then pulled into Sutton’s world and no one believes that Emma is not Sutton. Emma discovers that Sutton was murdered and she is the only one who can find the killer.

Spelled
by Betsy Schow 

Dorothea (Dot) has been cooped up in a palace her entire life due to a curse placed on her family that states a girl in her family will burn the fairy tale world down. Dot has always had everything she wants except freedom. One night during a ball, Dot learns that she is going to wed a man she has only met once and hates. In the heat of the moment, Dot wishes on a star and her wish majorly backfires, turning everything in the fairy tale world on its head. Her parents have disappeared and an evil witch is out to kill her. With the help of a klepto servant girl and her fiancé, she must figure out how to normalize the world.

Escape Under the Forever Sky
by Eve Yohalem

Thirteen year old Lucy Hoffman is the daughter of the American ambassador in Ethiopia. Lucy’s paranoid mother prevents her from experiencing the culture of Ethiopia with the exception of a monthly chaperoned safari excursion. Her only breaks from the endless monotony of the ambassador compound are infrequent visits with her friends Tana and Teddy. The only other person that Lucy has a connection with is Iskinder, the family’s house servant; this male companion is very important to Lucy because her father is working in Indonesia with the World Bank.

Lucy loves to read; in particular, she is fascinated with the Ethiopian fauna. This obsession comes in handy later in the book when her life depends on some of this knowledge.

Lucy hatches a plan with Tana to ditch her escort (Iskinder) and head off to a café to listen to live music. Tana’s new driver, Dawit, shows up at the café to retrieve the runaway girls; after depositing Tana at home, Dawit allegedly proceeds to transport Lucy to the compound. Lucy soon realizes that Dawit is not in the right part of town and tells him so, only to get no response. At this point, Lucy begins to panic and tries to escape. Eventually they stop and just when Lucy thinks she might have a chance to escape, a strange man joins her in the back seat and promptly drugs her.

She wakes up locked in a crude structure blindfolded and with her hands and feet bound. Ultimately she manages to remove the blindfold. Through a slat in the wall, she discovers she has 3 captors (Dawit, Markos, and Helena) accompanied by 2 vicious guard dogs. Helena comes in to feed Lucy and Lucy observes that Helena is a well-dressed British woman—a very unlikely suspect for an Ethiopian kidnapping.

The rest of the story involves Lucy’s plot to escape and subsequent adventure through the Ethiopian wilderness to become reunited with her parents. The epilogue explains the true reasons for the kidnapping. This novel is based on a true story. 

I liked this book for its unique story line and unusual setting. I admired Lucy’s ingenuity and ability to react quickly under stress.

Editor’s note: This review recently was printed in the Park Rapids Enterprise.