The Body in the Woods by April Henry

Interest Level: YA

Lexile: HL720L

Reading Level: 5.3
Genre: Realistic Fiction

While helping the Portland County Sheriff's Search and Rescue to seek a missing autistic man, teens Alexis, Nick, and Ruby find instead, a body and join forces to find the girl's murderer, forming an unlikely friendship, as well.

I recently learned that one of the differences between a mystery and a thriller is that in a thriller the bad guy is often established early on. I would call "The Body in the Woods" a thriller. Although, a student told me that I figured it out that the author did come out and tell the reader who the murder was. Either way, I found the story compelling. Even after I figured out who had done it, I wanted to read the book to the end. April Henry is a popular author with our middle school students. If you like real-life murder mysteries, I would recommend this book. One student did tell me that she had to stop reading it. It was too scary.