Ask a Bookseller: ‘Before the Hunt’ by Barry Lyga

On The Thread’s Ask a Bookseller series, we talk to independent booksellers all over the country to find out what books they’re most excited about right now.There’s been a trend on Ask a Bookseller these past few months of books that make you feel good about the world. This week, we’re in for something different. John Shableski of The Otto Bookstore in Williamsport, Penn., says the book that kept him up reading too late at night recently is a collection of YA short stories by Barry Lyga entitled “Before the Hunt.” The book is the first prequel of Lyga’s YA thriller “I Hunt Killers” trilogy. Both books feature 17-year-old Jasper “Jazz” Dent, whose father is a serial killer. “If you like Dexter and Hunger Games with a twist of humor, this book is spot on,” says Shableski. “Before the Hunt” takes place before Jazz’s father is discovered and jailed. Set in a small town in Georgia, Shableski says, “It's a wonderful take on a 17-year-old's perspective of life and love and happiness — and also dealing with the fact that his father is a serial killer. He struggles with the nurture-versus-nature thing, because as he likes to say in one of the books, ‘Take Your Kid to Work Day was different in my house.’” Jazz, Shableski says, has a wickedly dry sense of humor. The book classifies as horror, given its serious subject matter, but Shableski says the violence is implied rather than splashed across the page. The second book in the prequel series, “Every Hunter is Hunted,” is billed as an adult mystery featuring Jasper Dent. It comes out June 23.