From School Library Journal
Grade 9 Up - Nineteen-year-old cabbie Ed Kennedy has little in life to be proud of: his dad died of alcoholism, and he and his mom have few prospects for success. He has little to do except share a run-down apartment with his faithful yet smelly dog, drive his taxi, and play cards and drink with his amiable yet similarly washed-up friends. Then, after he stops a bank robbery, Ed begins receiving anonymous messages marked in code on playing cards in the mail, and almost immediately his life begins to swerve off its beaten-down path. Usually the messages instruct him to be at a certain address at a certain time. So with nothing to lose, Ed embarks on a series of missions as random as a toss of dice: sometimes daredevil, sometimes heartwarmingly safe. He rescues a woman from nightly rape by her husband. He brings a congregation to an abandoned parish. The ease with which he achieves results vacillates between facile and dangerous, and Ed's search for meaning drives him to complete every task. But the true driving force behind the novel itself is readers' knowledge that behind every turn looms the unknown presence - either good or evil - of the person or persons sending the messages. Zusak's characters, styling, and conversations are believably unpretentious, well conceived, and appropriately raw. Together, these key elements fuse into an enigmatically dark, almost film-noir atmosphere where unknowingly lost Ed Kennedy stumbles onto a mystery - or series of mysteries - that could very well make or break his life.

I absolutely loved Zusak's The Book Thief. So I felt compelled to pick up this book and I loved it just as much.

Zusak just has an amazing storytelling ability and his stories are so unique. I can't wait to pick up more of his books.

Sending this one off to a friend from bookobsessed.com.

I have The Book Thief but haven't read it yet - thanks for sending it.

The first book I have sat down and read in only a couple of days in a very long time. It took me a bit to get into it, but once he started getting the Aces, I was totally hooked. And as with any great book, I love how the last paragraph, or sentence, makes me sit and ponder a bit.

Lovely.

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