Flying - Carrie Jones

Mana wakes up from a dream and hears her mom yelling on the phone.  Mana's mom tells her not to worry, it was a telemarketer.  The next day Mana and her mom go to Lyle's track meet.  Lyle is one of her BFF's, and everyone thinks they are together including Lyle's mother.  Lyle does well at the track meet and she thinks about him for the rest of the day.  A few days later her mom has to go into work early, and she will see her at the basketball game.  Seppie, Mana's other BFF, picks her and Lyle up and they head to school.  Seppie and Lyle argue while Mana tries to wake up.  She daydreams about Lyle as being more than just one of her best friends.  By cheerleading practice in the afternoon Mana is still dragging.  She gets through practice and is woken up enough for the game.  At the game she notices a guy in sunglasses who keeps starting at Dakota.  At one point sunglasses guy grabs Dakota and takes him to the locker room area.  Mana and Lyle find Dakota tied up.  Lyle goes and calls the police while Mana lets him go.  China, the guy with the sunglasses, tries to protect her as Dakota's tongue spits green acid at them.  Lyle comes barging in with one of the sheriff's deputies seconds after China and Dakota have disappeared.  After the deputy goes off looking for Dakota and China, Mana explains to Lyle what went on.  He doesn't believe her, and thinks she has a concussion.  They finish cheering the game and Seppie drops them off at Mana's house.  As Mana puts her key into the door it swings open, which concerns Mana as her mom always keeps the door locked.  They go in to find the house destroyed and alien Dakota flying around.  Dakota escapes and Mana wonders if her mom was here when he destroyed the house when Lyle sees her car in the garage.  They search the house for her mom and find a creature with webbed feet in her mom's bedroom.  It attacks them and they kill it with a car.  Lyle says it reminds him of a Wendigo, but all Mana cares about is finding her mom.  They search the house and wait for the police.  They don't find her in the house and then see headlights coming toward the house.  They think it's the police, but men in black suits come out of black vans.  China tells them it isn't the police, and the creature was a Wendigo.  More sirens approach and he tells them they have to leave the scene now.  She and Lyle head to his house.  His mom has a strict no-girl in the house policy, so Mana has to be snuck in.  The police show up and Lyle goes to talk to them.  His parents are upset as is Mana.  She spends the night there and wakes up to Lyle's mom thinking they slept together.  Mana heads back home to get a change of clothes and sees a text from her mom telling her not to come home.  Things will be explained later.  China shows up there to and explains Mana's mother is his partner and they hunt aliens together.  After she gets cleaned up, Mana leaves with China and he tells her about aliens monitoring Earth.  Some are good and some are not.  There is a secret branch of the government that hunts down the bad ones and he and Mana's mother are a part of it.  As China continues to explain everything Lyle pops up in the back of the truck with a gun.  He though she was being kidnapped and was trying to rescue her.  Mana explains that isn't the case and they were heading to try and find her mom.  After everyone has calmed down and guns put down the three of them head to Maine to an underground lair.  Will they be able to find Mana's mother and why was alien Dakota ransacking Mana's house?

 I liked this book, but the first 30 pages seemed slow to me for some reason.  After Dakota is reveled to be alien, and he escapes the story picked up for me.  The story had a Men in Black feel to it with the underground lairs, and working together with some of the alien species.  Mana reminded me of a mix between Buffy and Katniss.  I loved the references to Doctor Who and Star Trek in the book as well.  It looks like it there will be a sequel as the ending leaves the story open to be continued. 

T.B.
10/1/16