The Book Hunter - Book Review of I Am Number Four by Sunny Lee

I Am Number Four by Pittacus Lore is a science fiction novel. The main character named John Smith is a Garde (or an alien) from the planet called Lorien. He was sent to earth when he was a child with eight other Gardes to escape from the invading Mogadorians who destroyed the planet Lorien. They all never had real names, so they were each assigned a number (John was given number four). John was very young when he was sent to earth so his guardian Henri protected him up until now. John is beginning to develop legacies, in his case: telekinesis (ability to move objects at a distance by mental power) and power to transmit plasma through his hands. Earth was meant to be a safe place for training and for getting ready to fight back the Mogadorians because of what they did to Lorien back in history. But the Mogadorians followed them and are killing the Gardes one by one. ”They killed Number One in Malaysia. Number Two in England. And Number Three in Kenya.” Will John make it? This might be the end of his life.

In this dangerous yet frightening story, John, a young alien boy struggles to survive from the Mogadorians on the planet earth and activates two important messages. The first one is don’t trust others, no matter how close you are with them; rather, trust yourself. In the story, some Mogadorians are disguised as humans that pretend to help John until one night John sneaks into this house and finds out that they were in disguise. The second one is to never give up on yourself, don’t stop, in fact sometimes help will come to you. When John went in that house and started fighting the disguised Mogadorians, he ended up being cornered when suddenly his guardian Henri came to rescue. The author captures the reader’s attention by putting some great humor and detail in helping us visualize each moment in the story. Also, after parts of big climaxes, he always puts in another big conflict that we would have never thought of, but keeps the story going smoothly. The story is very straightforward, it gives many visualizing details but never puts any unnecessary text.

I Am Number Four is full of action and danger. It is a wonderful novel to read for those who enjoy action, danger, fighting and maybe even those who love mystery! I Am Number Four shows feelings of a boy that has been wanted and has been chased ever since he was a child. I think this book is good for ages 11 and up. This book is exciting and worth reading.