Clever, exhilarant, and fresh, The Supernaturalist is science fiction that everyone can love.  Combine snappy and witty dialogue, heart-felt characters, and a plot with plenty of twists, and you get a first class read.  Even among the humor and action, Colfer is able to give humanity to his characters and weave in themes of self-identity, belonging, and purpose.

Colfer is probably best known for the Artemis Fowl Series, but he has written several other books that all have the same caliber of writing.  Colfer’s gift for dialogue, humor, and voice put him in the top echelon of authors for middle grade and young adult readers.  The Supernaturalist is a fantastic example of what happens when all the elements are there!

Content Analysis:

Profanity/Language:  1 religious exclamation; 7 mild obscenities.

Violence/Gore:  Verbal threats; a car accident with non-specified injuries and implied death of some; a character is punched in the nose; a surgery is described with brief detail; a chase with a fall resulting in death and injury; upon several occasions characters are shot with darts that wrap them in shrink-wrap; a character is shot with a dart that makes her ill; characters receive electric shocks from weapons; a character bites finger of another; extended scene in which creatures are killed, there are explosions resulting in the destruction of property, electric shock to humans, character is knocked unconscious; characters are abducted; a character is shot and killed, mention of blood; a character falls and is severely injured.

Sex/Nudity:  A character kisses another character (2 instances)

Mature Subject Matter:

Orphans, animal cruelty, vigilantism, corporate greed, death, using children as test subjects, environmental pollution.

Alcohol / Drug Use:

None.