Meg Cabot - Missing You (2006)

This is the fifth and final book in Cabot's Missing series.

Years have passed and Jess is in New York with her friend Ruth, studying at Julliard and trying to forget the past. After stopping the True Americans Jess joined the FBI  and ended up in Afghanistan fighting a war. The trauma burnt out her abilities and she returned home, broken, lost and unable to find herself. Then the last person she wants to see turns up, her ex-boyfriend Rob Wilkins, and he wants her to do the one thing she can't, find his missing sister.

This was a great ending to the series. I loved seeing Jess all grown up and coming to terms with her abilities and her life. It was great seeing her brother Douglas striking out on his own after he'd spent most of the series ill too. All very satisfying as bittersweet endings go. The subject matter was dark, child pornography, but the new adult Jess dealt with it without blowing anything up (so disappointing, I love explosions!). Cabot had brought about full character development over the years, Jess went from a young angry girl to an adult who understands that violence doesn't solve anything.

Meg Cabot - Sanctuary (2002)

This is the fourth book in Cabot's Missing series.

It's Thanksgiving and Jess is busy trying to get out of dinner with her family so she can make it to her boyfriend Rob's house to eat with him and his mother. On her way home she's stopped by police who've found the body of her neighbour, covered in racist carvings, left dead in a field.

Jess had known he was missing, but she'd thought he was out with friends so she hadn't tried to 'see' where he was. Now she blames herself and when another boy goes missing Jess is determined to use her abilities to find him and put the racist murderers in gaol, even if it outs her to the FBI.

Another dark storyline, but well-written. Cabot finds solutions to the darkness and gives us the happy ending we rarely get in real life. It's difficult to write books like this for young adults without making them adult books, but Cabot manages it. I really like this series, there's so many great characters with simple lives that are so interesting. Jess may have psychic abilities thrust on her, but she's an ordinary girl in all other ways. The books are worth reading just to experience the interactions between Jess, her family, friends and the FBI.

Meg Cabot - Safe House (2002)

This is the third book in Cabot's Missing series.

Jess is back from summer camp and finds herself blamed for the death of fellow student Amber Mackay. Amber had disappeared while Jess was away and didn't know she was missing, but that doesn't make the students at Ernest Pyle High School any less angry at Jess. When another girl goes missing everyone looks to Jess to save her and she's forced into trying to save Heather, whilst keeping her family safe from the FBI.

Considering this was a murder mystery it wasn't too heavy. Cabot is good at writing books where the subject matter doesn't draw you into the dark too deeply, but you're still wanting good to win and evil to be pummeled into gooey pulp. You can recognise that you're in Hell, but it doesn't overwhelm you. I like that about these books. They're darker than Cabot's Princess Diaries (which was more light than dark), but I can see how they're the next level up for kids developing. This is their first look at the horrors of the world and how to live with or fight it.

Meg Cabot - Code Name Cassandra (2001)

This is the second book in Cabot's series 'Missing'.

Jess, aka Lightning Girl, has told the world she's lost her powers to protect her family and friends from the media and government's constant harassment. To get away from it all she takes a job at a musically gifted summer camp, hours from home, and hopes it's far enough to put the last few months behind her. Everything's going great until a desperate father turns up needing Jess to find his daughter and the outcome has her running for her life.

I like any Meg Cabot book. They're fun young adult books. Lots of adventure and none of the trauma that the equivalent adult book throws at you. This is a great book, it's part of my I'm-stuck-in-bed-sick-and-need-a-happy-book shelf of books.

Rosemary Clement-Moore - Spirit and Dust

This is the second book in the Goodnight series, a family with varied psychic abilities. The focus of the books are on Daisy Goodnight - she speaks to the dead. It sounds cliched, but it's not. This book and the first are fun and slightly unusual in the author's approach to dealing with ghosts.

My favourite parts were when Daisy spoke to her dead relatives - they're always so cheerful and encouraging. Not your usual ghosts. Daisy can also read a part of someones life from an object that was a large part of their life, but it only covers a certain period of time. Like a snapshot of you from 2000, but that snapshot doesn't know what you look like in 2020. It made it very interesting, like a spirit treasure hunt where you collect bits of a dead person until you reach the right piece which knows what you need to know.

In this book Daisy is coerced into hunting for a kidnapped girl. Daddy is a crime lord who won't take no for an answer and the ghosts aren't happy about whatever it is his daughter has gotten involved in, particularly since it's killing them all over again...