The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict by Trenton Lee Stewart
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Although my rating for this book is the same as my rating for the first book in the series (this book is a prequel to the first book), for some reason this book resonated with me more. I liked the first book because of the diverse set of gifted kids. I liked this book for Nicholas himself. I am still trying to puzzle out why this book worked so much better for me than books 2 and 3 of the series and even more than book one, too. I think part of the reason is that, by focusing on Nicholas, you really got to know him. With the other books, your attention is split between the different children. Yes, there are other characters in this story - lots of them, but the focus is always on Nicholas.
If I have any quibble with the story, it is that the mysterious Mr. Harriton is never satisfactorily explained. I would like to accept Nicholas' assessment that there are simply a few people who are genuinely good, without need for justification, but that seems a bit skimpy for reasoning.
I nearly skipped this book, since, as the fourth book written in this "world", I feared it would be just more of the same, like books 2 and 3. I am happy to say that this wasn't true for me. I enjoyed this book. A lot.
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