Title:  Premonitions  by  Jude Watson, ISBN:  0-439-60995-X, Scholastic, New York, 2004, $6.99, 256pp.

Genre:  Coming of age, Young Adult

Characters:  Main – Grace and Emily

Plot:  Grace sees things that have or will happen.  She sees her mother’s death but is unable to tell her.  Grace ends up at her aunt’s house because nobody knows where Grace’s father is.  Not long after she moves into her aunt’s house, Grace is befriended by Emily.  She is not fond of Emily because Emily is always around but there is no one else for Grace to talk to.  Her aunt is busy and her cousin seems to want to avoid her. 

After a slight argument with Emily about going to the library, Grace has a vision that something has happened to Emily.  Grace’s fears are confirmed when Emily’s parents ask Grace for her help.  Grace cannot help because nobody knows of her ability.  It is her cousin who finally breaks the ice and gets Grace talking about her visions.  She is frightened and cannot tell anyone but slips and tells Emily’s mom that Emily is not dead. 

Grace and her cousin follow the visions to find Emily.  During her investigation, Grace is also taken.  She is taken to the same place where Emily is being held.  There are a lot of kids there and none seem to want to leave.  It’s as if they’ve been brainwashed.  Grace gets through to them and they escape.  Grace, Emily and the rest of the teenagers are safe from the kidnapper, a young man who thought he could create the perfect family.  He used his own dysfunctional family as a model and was going to kill all the teenagers like he killed his own family years before.

Touchy Areas:  Sexual insinuations, kidnapping, and child abuse

Related Titles: The Bar Code Tattoo by Suzanne Weyn   

Evaluation:  This book is action-packed.  It tells of a young lady who is dealing with the death of a parent, abilities unlike anyone she knows, and a missing

friend.  She perseveres.  I would rate this book 9 out of 10.

Reviewed by:  Judith Hesse, University of Toledo