Keepers of the Lost Cities by Shannon Messenger

Keepers of the Lost Cities is about a girl named Sophie, who’s just a normal teenager. Then, one day after school a boy named Fitz finds her. He tells her that she’s an elf, with the ability of a Telepath. At first Sophie is amused, but soon finds out that he isn’t joking. It all started when she was 5 years old and she hit her head. She was rushed to the hospital by her neighbor Mr. Forkle. Then almost instantly, she could read minds. 

She then visits Fitz again the next day and meets his family. They tell her that they’ve been searching for her the last 15 years. Then, they discuss attending Foxfire with Fitz, There she learns to improve her telepathy and learns that she has more than one ability. But in order for her to be an elf, she has to remove her human family’s memory of her. This means that her family will never remember her and still breaks her to this day. 

Since she can’t live by herself, Sophie gets a foster parents. She meets Grady and Edaline who have had a surprising past. Their daughter, Jolie, had died in a fire. Her new family also runs an animal reserve, helping animals until they are healed and tamed.At school, Sophie makes friends with a girl named Marella and gets teased by a snotty girl named Stina Heks. Later on, Sophie goes to Slurps and Burps, a place with medicine and elixirs, with her family. She meets Dex and his dad Kesler who is the owner of the shop. From that moment, Dex became Sophie’s best friend.  

Sophie also visits the healing center, where she meets Elwin and Keefe for the first time. He also becomes Sophie’s friend and is always following Sophie and making sure she’s okay. He is also a trouble maker and spends most of his time in detention. Since Sophie has a lot of new friends, she spends less time with Marella. Marella then becomes best friends with her enemy and nemesis, Stina Heks. 

Sophie later gets kidnapped by a group called the Neverseen with her best friend Dex. They were drugged and scarred. Luckily, an individual helped them and they were able to teleport to safety. Sophie fades and Dex has many scars. When someone fades completely in a light leap, they lose themselves and perish. Sophie was lucky to survive and promises next time she would wear a nexus. A nexus is a bracelet like device that helps hold them together while in a light leap. 

Sophie also finds out that she is part of Project Moonlark. Project Moonlark helped create her and twisted her DNA so that she could have an impenetrable mind. Later on, Sophie does risky tasks for the Councillors, finds more hidden abilities, almost dies, finds out more devastating news, and discovers something.. sparkly?  Can Sophie handle the pressure and trust her friends? And most importantly…, can she find her real family before it’s too late? Find out in the Keepers of Lost Cities Series.