Best Books of 2013 So Far: Jon Mooney's Pick

Who the heck is Jon Mooney and does he like NASCAR? Well, Jon is a sales rep for Penguin, now known as Penguin Random House and he is easily one of the finest sales reps we know. He is certainly more professional and mild mannered than us; he is in fact risking his entire reputation simply by associating himself with this blog. And yes, my lordy, yes...Jon loves NASCAR and everything car related. It's kind of adorable. 

Here's Jon's pick:

My favorite book of 2013 is LEXICON by Max Barry, a totally wild, action-packed thriller about the power of language and coercion.  At an exclusive, secret school students learn to use language to manipulate minds and use words as weapons.  The best students become “poets” and enter a shadowy organization that controls the world’s populace. A homeless teen, Emily Ruff, attracts the attention of this organization. While attending their school, she learns some of their powerful secrets but leaves before she can complete her full training.  While on the run from the organization she causes a catastrophe of unspeakable proportions. LEXICON is a riveting, powerhouse of a novel that will snare your attention from page one and question your own ideas of language, data-collection, privacy and identity.