Jennifer E. Smith's books have been recommended by many reliable sources, so I grabbed the single book my library had in. Perhaps her other books are better, but The Storm Makers is fairly mundane. The girl and boy twins, whose names are not necessary, have moved from Chicago to rural Wisconsin. Their father has decided that small-time farming will support the family better than having both parents work full-time while he works on an invention and the mother paints (yes, illogical details are distracting and annoying to me). The twins are growing apart as they enter their teens. Strange things begin happening with the boy, and it turns out he is the youngest Storm Maker ever, one of a group of people who can control weather and earth. Complications ensue.
While the concept of a teenage boy able to control weather is interesting, the story devolves into a power struggle within the Storm Makers association. Shockingly, the smooth man in the black suit is evil while, the young woman mechanic and absent-minded drifter are good. Even more surprisingly, the struggles regarding the Storm Makers serve to bring the twins back to each other. To read a book about siblings struggling with strange powers and conflicts between them, read Katherine Catmull's Summer and Bird. It's a completely different book than anything I've read this year.
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