Touched

By: Cyn Balog
Publisher: Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Publishing Date: August 2012
ISBN: 978-0-385-74032-6
Reviewed by: Amy Lignor
Review Date: September 2012

Nick Cross is a truly amazing character. He, not unlike many, has a voice in his head, but his voice actually tells him the future - every step that will occur that takes someone else’s life. However, if Nick plays hero, listens to the voice, yet decides to veer off course to save someone different, then he dooms another.

Example: Nick Cross is working as a lifeguard at the Jersey Shore. On his way to work one day, the voice tells him all about a young woman who will be killed. As he heads to work, he sees a truck about to back into a girl and kill her. Veering off the ‘path’ the voice laid out for him, by the time Nick gets to his lifeguard’s chair, a little girl by the name of Emma, who he was supposed to save, has drowned.

In essence, when Nick hears the voice he can either save or ignore the voice completely. However, once he lives the future and makes his decision, his brain basically shuffles the cards and a new future is dealt for Nick Cross. He’s not the only one who has this gift that’s basically a nightmare for him. His mother is also cursed with it and it has made her into a recluse, never going outside, barely coming downstairs, and issuing moans constantly. Nick doesn’t want to end up like that and because of his ‘save,’ perhaps he won’t have to.

Even though he is devastated by the young child drowning, the girl Nick does save is named Taryn and most definitely has a place in his future. You see, Taryn’s grandmother has a book of some truly crazy spells. A bibliomancer by trade, it was in the past when Taryn’s grandmother brought this curse down upon Nick’s head and only he and Taryn together - going through a seriously odd and exciting adventure - can perhaps change the past and hopefully stop Nick from heading down his new path which the voice in his head claims is his absolute death.

This author has written such a spectacular tale that you will be wishing Nick Cross is a name that appears in the world of fiction yet again.

Quill Says: You will not put this one down!