I read a lot of books for my column that I think will likely appeal to teenage boys or girls (or even younger) and sometimes I read a book that I think will probably crossover equally to each gender but it is rare that I read a book that I am convinced is perfect for teen readers.

I mean they are going to love this.

I just finished Lonely Werewolf Girl by Martin Millar and the best way I can describe it is as a werewolf soap opera with subplots involving fashion, music and bloody death of many werewolves. You have moments where the big discussion is how to find more episodes of Sabrina the Teenage Witch on cable followed by a fight that results in multiple bad guys getting pulverized. It's blood and taffeta; frank discussion of Joan Jett followed by the importance of literacy.

How in the hell Millar pulls off this off so well is totally beyond me but man, I'd love to be his student.

The lynchpin is Kalix, the werewolf girl of the title who had a seriously bad upbringing (we're talking a mother that has no problem pitting one child against another in some epically serious conflict) and tried to kill her father. Everyone is after her and they are going to get her until a couple of humans happen upon her, save her life, and then slowly but surely become her best friends forever. And then a whole bunch of other awesome stuff happens that is funny, scary and poignant and all the people you care about live happily ever after.

I completely see why I am not the only one who loved this book. It will be reviewed in my July column - expect a serious rave. (And yes, I still have a duplicate copy if you want to read it - email colleenatchasingraydotcom.)

I mentioned the other day that I enjoyed Jay Lake's Escapement (for my June column) but didn't really explain why. This is actually the second book in Lake's alt history world, following Mainspring. I didn't read that one - although I imagine if you had the events of the second book wouldn't be quite such a surprise. But as far as just opening up Escapement and liking it a lot, well I had no problems there. What's cool is that this is a clockwork world - literally. The world runs on gears and springs and is centered on a "...hundred mile high Equatorial Wall that holds up the great Gears of the Earth." The most significant part of the story is Paolina; a teenage girl who was born with the same kind of ability to understand mechanical things as Isaac Newton. It's not like she's following in Newton's footsteps or anything, she just has a clarity when she sees the mechanism of the world that most people lack. In other words, Paolina is freaky brilliant and she is damn tired of dealing with the idiots who run her sad little shipwreck town that clings to the side of the Wall. When she gets a chance to break out on her own she takes it, and the rest of the book follows her adventures.

There are two storylines parallel to Paolina's - one with an airship sailor who is sent on a British royal mission to protect a scientific expedition seeking to drill into the Wall in Africa and the second focusing on an American librarian (as in the American colonies) who is a member of a secret spiritual society who has decided to throw her under the bus in the name of politics and finds herself saved from that death by the attack of a Chinese navy sub - pretty much frying pan into fire but lots of cool stuff follows. Slowly all three storylines converge and along the way readers learn all sorts of religious and political intrigues and get to kick serious butt with Paolina as she tries to find greater knowledge and gets very disappointed when she realizes that pretty much by herself she knows more than most. (And certainly more than the leading governments of the world.)

Escapement is a big thinking novel; one that makes you ponder what you would do and how you would feel if presented with the kind of circumstance that the three main characters find themselves in. There's also creepy flying angel monsters, Brass Men and powerful transportation systems and it all ends in Mogadishu. Good smart stuff is Mr. Lake's book and certainly another title (although written for adults) that teenage boys and girls will equally respond favorably to.

Other interesting things I've read lately:

Frank Graham Jr in Audubon Magazine on fog:

Much has changed since my first day on this coast, but not the tides and fogs. A hasty glance at the tide chart tells me when the sea comes and goes, though the fog keeps to no timetable (a statement a visitor might not accept in July, when our planned outings are canceled morning after morning as the fog closes in). But often by day I can see a thick fogbank hovering just offshore. As it begins to move up the bay, one island after another is doused like a flame under an old-fashioned candle-snuffer, and soon the murk is all around me, with the trees dripping. If I can hear the horn at Petit Manan, the atmosphere seems denser still.

After reading this I am desperate to learn more of the lighthouse keeper's wife in Petit Manan, who took over after he left and later applied for his position but was turned down (of course) in spite of her experience. What on earth kept her out there in 1817 and why did she want to stay? There has to be a story in that life someplace.

In Smithsonian Magazine, the wonder that is Silver Springs, Florida; one of my favorite places. (To have been there in 1938 - it must have been amazing!)

Finally, I was very impressed by Raja Shehadeh's Palestinian Walks when I reviewed it for Booklist and I'm delighted to see it become an award winner. This is one of those books (like Matt Beynon Rees' mystery series) that explains the Israeli/Palestinian Conflict in a way that is understandable to Western readers who might know little about the region. It is a stirring and deeply affecting work and deserves a lot of readers.