Thirst No. 5: The Sacred Veil
In her five thousand years as a vampire, Sita has forgotten only two portions of her life: the eleventh century with Landulf of Capua and her imprisonment with Ralph and Harrah Levine in Auschwitz during World War II. Earlier, she had been sent back “to fix her mistake” during the battle between the Pandavas and the Kaurvas; similarly, their present day quest for Veronica’s veil and the safety of the Levine’s granddaughter, Sarah Goodwin, is forcing her back to her tortuous time in Auschwitz. In each incident she left men she loved to suffer as she escaped. Both events involve the blood of Christ—the sword with Christ’s blood in the eleventh century and Christ’s image from Golgotha stained on the veil in the twentieth—and vimanas, vehicles from outer space. In this fifth and final book in the Thirst series, Pike once again leads Sita and her entourage of ordinary and extraordinary friends through horrifying yet mesmerizing adventures that culminate in Sita’s choice between her past normal life and the present.      HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: It’s the conclusion to a New York Times best-selling series, and everyone is gonna want to know how it ends. Grades 9-12. --Frances Bradburn