Thursday, May 20, 2010

The Mysterious Benedict Society

Ella got the first book for Christmas, and she was completely absorbed in it. I had to pry it out of her hands each night to get her to go to sleep. Once she finished it, I decided to read the book to see what it was all about.

Ella and I have now read the first two books and are waiting for the third to come out in paperback.

With the exception of the Harry Potter series, I think this is probably the best youth fiction series I've read yet. The plots are dense and challenging, and the vocabulary had Ella asking me to define words, which I liked.

The books center around four exceptional children who come from not-normal backgrounds. They go through several challenges at the beginning of the first book, which is how they end up living with the mysterious Mr. Benedict, who immediately sends them off on a mission to save the world. The second book is about the four kids heading off to rescue Mr. Benedict on their own.

The characters are very well written, and the stories are griping. I couldn't put the books down, either.

Ella and I are waiting with baited breath to get our hands on the third volume.

1 comment:

Tasha said...

I listened to the first book on audio, and I liked when they were taking all the tests in the beginning, and they all had their own unique strategies. I listened to that part twice before moving on.