The book that I am currently reading as my independent reading book is The Lives Of Tao, by Wesley Chu. I read this book as my summer reading project, and I enjoyed it so much that I have decided to read it again. It is about an out-of-shape IT technician, who wakes up hearing voices in his head. It turns out that he is actually hearing an ancient alien life-form called Tao. The life-forms race crash landed on earth way before people were a concept. There are two opposing factions of this race: the peace loving Prophus, and the savage Genjix. The life forms find hosts to live in, and the two sides train these people to become their warriors. This is the terrible situation the overweight technician has gotten chosen to be a part of. He of course had no idea of this, and now is being forced to train for his unwanted companion. The story also deals with key topics such as obesity, friendship, and trust, all of which make the reader think about the motives of characters. I think this is why I personally enjoyed the book so much, because it kept me engaged the entire time reading, and it made me think deeper than the surface.
One of the main ideas is that there is a hero inside every one of us. It says this on the cover of the book, that's how important it is. And it is true. Each one of us has something unique about us, and in the IT technicians case, he was smarter than other agents. It was very hard for him to realize this about himself due to all of his struggles with weight, but he found it eventually. And this is the biggest theme of the book. We can all be the hero, we just have to find it within ourselves and make it happen.