A crooked mark

Review by Booklist Review

In Matthew's world, Lucifer often marks the souls of those who survive near-death experiences; some Marked will cause escalating harm to those who cross them. Matthew and his father have always moved around for his dad's work with the Second Sweep, the shadowy and dangerous organization responsible for judging and eradicating the Marked. On his seventeenth birthday, the Sweep sends Matthew a solo assignment to test his readiness. As Matthew watches Rae, aka "the project," for signs of the Mark, he also gets a chance to experience living a more normal teenage life, and his perspective begins to shift. Main characters are thoughtfully drawn and interesting, and the slow-burn romantic chemistry is cute. While a large secondary cast feels a bit muddled, and some foundational relationships a little thin, deep questions of morality, judgment, and inevitable outcomes are counterweighted by violent action scenes that are numerous and engaging. Readers will forgive the ending for wrapping up a little neatly as thoughts about the potential for darkness lurking inside anyone will linger after the story ends.

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

Kao deftly blends chilling, slow-burn psychological horror with supernatural elements and moving relationships in this intense debut. Seventeen-year-old Matt Watts works with his father as members of Second Sweep, a covert organization dedicated to identifying and executing people marked by Lucifer. The Marked, those who have escaped certain death, are considered very dangerous, especially because of their rapidly developing abilities that allow them to psychically manipulate their surroundings. Matt's first solo mission is to befriend and, if necessary, execute 16-year-old Rae Winter, the sole survivor of a multi-fatality car accident. Matt inserts himself into Rae's mundane life, moving to the charming suburb of Mills Creek and enrolling in school for the first time after being homeschooled by his father. But as the two teens grow closer, Matt struggles to reconcile kind and beautiful Rae with the treacherous Marked he's been forced to annihilate and confront horrifying truths about his profession. Through Matt's snarky first-person narration, Kao weaves a captivating tale laced with aptly fatalistic humor that closely examines the unraveling of one teen's entire worldview and the overwhelming stress of living a double life. Matt is half Chinese, half white; Rae has light brown hair and hazel eyes. Ages 14--up. (June)

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Review by School Library Journal Review

Gr 9 Up--When teenager Matthew Watts and his dad set Mrs. Polly's house ablaze with her trapped inside it, they do it believing she has been corrupted (Marked) by the Devil. As agents of the Second Sweep, they covertly document the lives of potentially Marked individuals, with every observed mishap or injury connected to the person serving as possible proof that their soul is beyond saving. Matthew's first solo job comes when his father tasks him to evaluate Rachel (Rae) Winters and Matthew embeds himself at Mills Creek High School. Rae was unharmed in a car accident that killed her father; Matthew befriends Rae while secretly evaluating her using his father's methods. However, Rae's grief over the loss of her dad, the strength of her bonds with friends, and her emerging relationship with Matthew ultimately put pressure on his connection to his own father and cause him to question the existence of the Sweep itself. This builds to a confrontational climax that twists to an unexpected conclusion. The book has an arresting opener, but the uncertainty created over the Sweep's existence makes Matthew's actions difficult to justify. He does have a redemptive arc, but it strains credulity given what transpires. Rae is a strong character, and while there is diversity in the secondary cast, they are ancillary to the progression of the main story. VERDICT Some appeal for readers of supernatural thrillers, but the lack of clarity muddles the narrative and results in a messy conclusion. An additional selection.--Michael Van Wambeke

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

A life of demon-hunting doesn't leave much time to examine personal demons. Matthew Watts has grown up on the road with his father, following assignments from the Second Sweep, a secret organization whose mission is to hunt the Marked, people whose souls have been claimed by Lucifer. On his 17th birthday, Matt is gifted with his first solo mission. It's up to him to determine if Rae Winter, the only survivor of a tragic accident that claimed her father's life, may have been possessed in the moments between life and death. After settling into Mills Creek near San Francisco, Matt infiltrates Rae's life, trying to identify signs that will prove she is Marked. What he doesn't expect is to find himself wondering what might have been if he'd had a typical teen experience--or developing an interest in Rae that goes beyond his assignment. The diversity of ways grief can be expressed is smartly woven into the narrative through Matt's observations of the Winter family; his own mother died when he was a toddler. Matt's questions about the mutability of identity and values as his worldview expands outside the bubble of the Second Sweep will resonate with readers as he comes to terms with the bad he has done and determines how to make things right. Matt's late mother was Chinese, and his father is implied White; Rae reads White. This thoughtful debut offers both supernatural thrills and careful character development. (Paranormal. 12-18) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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chapter 1 I don't know how it feels when the Devil scratches a soul. My father says He must have the lightest touch, because no one ever notices His crooked claw leave a stain on something that should belong only to them. They smile their old smiles, crack the same jokes, eat and play and work and laugh just as they used to, but the Mark festers inside, growing and feeding like a parasite. By the time anyone notices something is wrong, it's too late. Lucifer has already won. Not tonight, though. I brace myself in the passenger seat as the car bounces down the moonlit road. Dad killed the headlights a mile back, and if we hadn't driven this way hundreds of times before, we would have run straight into a tree by now. Yet nine months of careful work have given us plenty of hours to prepare. By the time we finished documenting sweet Mrs. Polly's chilling descentfrom lucky survivor of a restaurant explosion to heartless killer Marked by Lucifer, Dad had it all planned out. The matches sit in the console between us. My mouth turns sour as my stomach gives another heave, and I clamp my teeth together, waiting for it to pass. Nine months of getting to know someone has a way of bleeding into an accidental friendship, making an already impossible job even harder. In the dim light, the determined line of Dad's jaw holds only cold certainty, but doubt shrieks at me like a knife on glass. It's not easy to judge a soul. I have to give Lucifer credit. There might not be any serpent in the tree or horned man with a pitchfork, but He's still banging on our door. He's just gotten a lot more creative. Clever bastard found a brand-­new way to wreak havoc in the human world. Accidents. The semitruck bearing down on your car. The train you think you can beat across the tracks. The safety harness that snaps halfway up the mountain. One moment you're in this world, and then--­ Bam! Hello, afterlife. There's a split second, however, when you aren't quite in either. You're right in the middle of the jump, eyes squeezed shut and both feet in the air, so you never see Lucifer extend a slender finger. It's a delicate scrape, the smallest Mark on your soul, and then He sends you back. You're alive, and everyone calls it a miracle, but God had nothing to do with it. It's something much, much worse. Of course, not everyone who survives an accident is Marked. Some people really do get lucky, but you can never tell the difference just by looking at them. The Marked appear as normal as you or me, and that jump from this world to the next makes anyone fair game. A life filled with kindness and charity offers no protection. No shield. If Lucifer feels like leaving His couch at the moment you ski into a tree, all bets are off, and no one knows whether luck or the Devil saved you in that second you nearly died. I'm still not certain which saved Mrs. Polly. But Dad is. The house comes into view--­a modest cottage on the isolated road, the familiar porch swing motionless in the shadows. Blackness bleeds from sleeping windows, and the single light beside her door offers the only glow in the surrounding darkness. Dad turns off the engine, and silence falls like the thud of a gavel. "Ready, Matthew?" he asks. Not at all. "Maybe we should give it more time." I brace against the frown growing on Dad's face. "Just to be sure. She volunteered at the animal shelter yesterday--­" "And the sign over the door fell and crushed Jessa Barney's skull twenty minutes after she yelled at Mrs. Polly for driving too fast in the parking lot," Dad finished. "If we had acted sooner, Jessa would still be alive." "The chains holding that sign were old. One had already broken, remember?" My voice rises, and I fight to steady it. "Jessa's family plans to sue the shelter for not fixing it sooner." "And it just happened to break the moment she stood under it?" Dad shakes his head. "Matthew, we've been over this. You saw the changes." The deaths and injuries that surrounded Mrs. Polly these last months had filled the pages of my notebook and made Dad's fingers tap faster each night. The accidents started small: Little George Winton fractured his arm after he left his skateboard lying out for Mrs. Polly to trip over, and Vicky Becerra slipped and fell off the stage as she went to collect her first-­place ribbon for the blueberry pie that beat Mrs. Polly's in the annual fair. But then the brakes of Edward Fisher's car failed the day he insulted Mrs. Polly's new hairstyle, and Marian Wong choked to death on her steak as she laughed at Mrs. Polly for toppling a stack of dishes. A few more bodies dropped, and when a flowerpot finally fell off abalcony and killed Eileen Patterson minutes after she shorted Mrs. Polly at the cash register, Dad knew. "Too much coincidence," he said, and I agreed. Verdict rendered. But now . . . I think of the afternoons spent in her kitchen, trying new recipes and sharing apple pie, and force my mouth open once more. "What if we missed something? A few more days, just to be sure--­" Dad interrupts. "I liked Elisabeth Polly too. But waiting will only make this harder." He picks up the matches. "Time to go." My fingers dig into the seat, every part of me begging to turn the car around and drive home. But that's not the job. The lessons that began almost a decade ago ring through my head, and the rule by which Dad lives--­by which he taught me to live as well--­incinerates any last objections. When Lucifer Marks a soul and returns it to this world, all we can do is light the fire and make it burn. We open the doors and climb out. Excerpted from A Crooked Mark by Linda Kao All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

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