Hunting Lila by Sarah Alderson

Title: Hunting Lila
Author: Sarah Alderson
Series: Lila #1
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Date Published: August 4, 2011
Buy: Amazon

Goodreads Summary

17-year-old Lila has two secrets she’s prepared to take to the grave. The first is that she can move things just by looking at them. The second is that she’s been in love with her brother’s best friend, Alex, since forever.

After a mugging exposes her unique ability, Lila decides to run to the only people she can trust—her brother and Alex. They live in Southern California where they work for a secret organisation called The Unit, and Lila discovers that the two of them are hunting down the men who murdered her mother five years before. And that they’ve found them.

In a world where nothing and no one is quite as they seem, Lila quickly realises that she is not alone—there are others out there just like her—people with special powers—and her mother’s killer is one of them…

I wish I had picked this up sooner. Whenever I was searching through my recommendations, I would see this. I mean I only saw the cover so from the cover and the title I assumed this was about a girl running away and a bunch of people looking for her, I assumed it was a realistic fiction/contemporary. After a while though, I was like screw it, let’s check what this is about because the cover allured me (I am such a cover whore). I am so glad though I did.. I read the summary and I felt as if this book had been written for me. I had been waiting for so long for something like this, I think this is what started my obsession with books that had humans with super powers and romances which involved falling in love with your older brother’s best friend.

The only reason this book didn’t get a five was because Lila could be a little obsessed with Alex. It annoyed me but I don’t know, I am going to claim it was different in this case because I loved this book too much to concentrate on the one thing I didn’t like.

Oh and hehe, this book has people running away in it. YAY! I love it when people are on the run, it’s so exciting, because when I live their experience through the main character I can FEEL the thrill to it, the excitement. Okay so the plot was pure genius and absolutely fun. I am not going to say anything about it because I am not good with discussing my feelings about things that make me  happy. The firsts are always closer to you. This book made the list of many firsts so I kind of love it, firsts in the YA genre anyway.

Oh yeah and this book is unpredictable as well, sometimes it is very easy to become predictable with a mystery/thriller. People start guessing stuff before it even happens and most of the times they are right. There are hints here and there but most of the things make you gasp with surprise and push your nose further into the book because it’s like a drug, you cannot get enough of it.

Oh and Alex gets his own reason for loving the book. Omg what do I say about him? *squeals* ALEX. WHY YOU NO BE REAL? I mean okay he was a bit annoying with the whole pushing Lila away but he was NEVER a jerk like most guys in YA become while trying to push the girl away, he attempted an explanation of sorts. Also he is so cute. GAHH I am not going to say anything more or I’ll become a puddle of fan girl.

I already talked about the one thing I didn’t like about Lila’s character but other than that flaw, she was so loveable and relateable. She is also strong. She can make her own decisions even if it means disagreeing with her brother AND Alex. She can tell right from wrong and she won’t believe everything, she wants her proof first. Smart girl this one. Plus she isn’t afraid to admit some things. She doesn’t have any particular control over her mouth, she’ll say something and then regret it. We all do that don’t we?

Now I don’t know how to conclude this. How about with a ‘EVERYBODY GO READ THIS’. NOW!!!

Now if you don’t mind I am going to re-read some of my favorite scenes from the book because I’ve been reminded of all the reasons why I love it.