One of my 9th graders gave this to me and said "I love this! You have to read it!" And when a student says that, well...you have to read it. I never would have chosen this on my own; ancient civ. and war history aren't really my jam. All that said, I thought this was a good book. It's incredibly violent (had to be given the subject) and the use of modern slang was annoying, but the characters were great and the story kept me hooked.