After the First Death (by Robert Cormier)

Kate, the seventeen-year-old temporary bus driver, does her best to calm the children as they wait in the heat for rescue. She hides a spare key to the bus, and when Miro temporarily steps off, she tries to drive the bus away, but the engine stalls.

Much of the story is told through the eyes of Ben, the general's son, whom the general sends to the terrorists with proof that their leader has been captured. But is it really Ben who's talking? A surprise ending reveals what has happened to Ben, and to his father.

Kate, the young bus driver, constantly weighs her options as she struggles to outwit her captors. Even a child on the bus, smart little Raymond, becomes human to readers, increasing the emotional intensity when the hijackers kill him. Most interesting is Ben, the son of the general. We see Ben in alternating chapters as he remembers the incident with the terrorists and as he awaits a visit at his school by his father. Ben appears to be suicidal, but readers don't know why. Cormier gives the book a stunning twist when readers discover that the narrator of those chapters may have been someone other than Ben. The shocker of an ending lifts the book out of a standard suspense genre, transforming it into an intriguing psychological study.