On Four’s first day of school, Mark starts to pick on Four after he sees him talking to Sarah. He also makes an enemy of Mark James, Sarah’s jealous ex-boyfriend and star football player. When they learn that Number Three is dead, they move to the small town of Paradise, Ohio, where Four adopts the name “John Smith” for his new identity.įour enrolls as a student at Paradise High School, where he meets Sarah Hart, his kind and beautiful classmate and photographer whom he quickly develops a crush on. At the start of the novel, Four and his Cêpan, Henri, are living in Florida, having moved and created brand new identities 21 times over the last decade to remain hidden from the Mogadorians.

The novel opens with the death of Number Three, which means that Four is now next in line. Number Four is the fourth member of the Garde. Each of the nine members of the Garde is bound by a protective charm that ensures that they can only be killed in the order of their numbers as long as they all stay apart. The nine Garde members are responsible for defending the planet of Lorien, while the Cêpan are responsible for teaching the Garde about the history of the planet and helping the Garde develop and hone their Legacies. The nine Garde and their accompanying Cêpan escaped to Earth in hopes of one day returning to their home planet once it could again sustain life. Ten years ago, a powerful and deadly race of aliens known as the Mogadorians invaded and defeated the planet of Lorien.

The Loric race is made up of two groups: the Garde, who possess supernatural powers known as Legacies, and the Cêpan, the keepers or guardians assigned to each member of the Garde at an early age. I Am Number Four is told from the first-person perspective of 15-year-old Number Four (aka John Smith), an alien from the planet Lorien.

I am number four author