Chokerby Elizabeth Woods

Sixteen-year-old Cara Lange has been a loner ever since she moved away from her best and only friend, Zoe, years ago. She eats lunch with the other girls from the track team, but they're not really her friends. Mostly she spends her time watching Ethan Gray from a distance, wishing he would finally notice her, and avoiding the popular girls who call her "Choker" after a humiliating incident in the cafeteria.Then one day Cara comes home to find Zoe waiting for her. Zoe's on the run from problems at home, and Cara agrees to help her hide. With her best friend back, Cara's life changes overnight. Zoe gives her a new look and new confidence, and next thing she knows, she's getting invited to parties and flirting with Ethan. Best of all, she has her BFF there to confide in.But just as quickly as Cara's life came together, it starts to unravel. A girl goes missing in her town, and everyone is a suspect—including Ethan. Worse still, Zoe starts behaving strangely, and Cara begins to wonder what exactly her friend does all day when she's at school. You're supposed to trust your best friend no matter what, but what if she turns into a total stranger? (goodreads.com)

People! This book is fantastic! I am not just saying that because it showed up on Wednesday out of the blue from Simon & Schuster Canada, I am saying this because from the moment I started reading it after dinner last night until just after work tonight I could not put it down (except to sleep and work, which sucked). I would have finished it all last night but I was so exhausted my eyes were seeing double and I had to put the book down with less than 100 pages to go. As soon as I got home from work tonight, I picked it up and finished it before I even thought about what to have for dinner (answer: a bowl of Kellogg's Raisin Bran).Before this book magically appeared in my mailbox yesterday I had never even heard of it. I opened it up and sure, it's pretty and all in person, but I didn't know anything about it and I am not a major fan of contemporary literature so I did some research on Goodreads. It has a lot of many star ratings and people found it psychologically disturbing. That was enough to get me to start it then and there! Yay, psychological thrillers! I don't need to sleep at night without night terrors, nope! Bring it on!Since I didn't read all of the reviews I hadn't spoiled myself on the story and I will not spoil any of you. I will just say I did not see that coming and I was glued to my seat, biting my nails waiting for that shoe to drop like I did while reading Beautiful Malice in August.The worst (best?) part is that this is not a long book and yet my heart rate was racing throughout the entire read just WAITING and KNOWING something was coming. It was like the first time I ever road Splash Mountain at Disney World and I KNEW the big drop was coming and so each time the boat stopped or slowed down or went up a tiny incline I braced myself for the DROP only to have the boat continue meandering along its merry way. I honestly thought I was going to have a heart attack since my anxiety was so strong my chest hurt and by the time the drop did come I was so panicked I hardly reacted! Ha! (I'm much more of a Snow White & the Seven Dwarves or Winnie The Pooh's Adventure type Disney attraction girl.)It also looks like this is a debut author book for this year! I didn't even know about it, so you know what I'm going to do? Add it to my Debut Author Challenge list. Wheeee!The book arrived on shelves on January 4, 2011 - If you like thriller type stories, I highly recommend you check this one out!Thank you Simon & Schuster Canada for this amazing surprise! You totally made my first week of 2011!