#AtoZChallenge: Card, Orson Scott -- #bookreview of Lost and Found

Lost and found by Orson Scott Card
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ezekiel Bliss finds lost things and returns them, a compulsion that has gotten him into trouble with the police so often that he drives himself to distraction to ignore it. Beth Sorenson is a proportionate dwarf too smart for her own good, who can pretty much get anyone to do what she says just by talking to them. Beth wiggles her way into Ezekiel's "shunning bubble", they agree to take part in a research group that studies their micropowers (which are like superhero powers, just not as useful), and along the way, Ezekiel helps the police and learns how to be a friend to the only one he's got.

Lost and Found is one of those books I'd probably love a lot more if I'd read it when I was younger. Sometimes, I wonder if I liked Ender's Game as much as I do because I read it at just the right age. Because I really wanted to like this. You've got two snarky teens against the world, and the only two humans who aren't against them are Ezekiel's father and the police detective who really wants Ezekiel to help him find a missing kid. What's there not to love? (Though I probably have to note that Ender's Game reads like it's written for adults whereas this one was definitely written for the much, much younger end of YA.)

Card still hits the right spots with his emotional arcs and there's nothing lacking in the action; the only major thing I can pinpoint for sure is that after a while, all the snarkiness became a little too over the top. There could have been a little more variance in the way the characters interacted with each other. I also saw one of the twists from quite far off, but seeing I'm probably two decades older than the target market, that's probably me and not him.

I'm giving this 4-stars because whilst it's not AMAZING, it's actually pretty enjoyable for someone a lot younger and less cynical than me (e.g. hopefully the actual target age group). Personally, it fits more on the 3-star scale. I liked it, but eh.

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No flash fiction today, sorry. Back tomorrow!