Publishers Weekly
07/17/2023
Twelve-year-old Hazel Woods, a would-be sleuth, can’t resist the temptation to eavesdrop on her older brother Den’s phone conversation, during which he makes plans to meet his best friend Everett after dark at Woodland Cemetery. Though Hazel believes that a graveyard in Forest Park, Ill., is “not the kind of place you want to hang out in the dark. Or in the light. Or anytime, really,” Hazel trails Den, eager to investigate rumors of hauntings. Accompanied by her best friend Maggie, Hazel follows the boys to the cemetery, where a game of hide and seek results in Everett’s disappearance. Den, Hazel, and Maggie resolve to find him, but as their frantic search unfolds, disturbing messages reading “found u” and creepily scrawled smiley faces begin appearing on random objects. This relentlessly eerie ghost story by Currie (The Girl in White)—based on the 1918 Hagenbeck-Wallace train disaster, per an author’s note—sometimes struggles to maintain a steady gait. Still, malevolent atmosphere permeates this terrifying telling, and Hazel’s energetic first-person voice, combined with her organic relationship with Den, will invest readers from the jump. Protagonists cue as white. Ages 8–13. Agent: Shannon Hassan, Marsal Lyon Literacy. (Sept.)
From the Publisher
"The fright level was just right for this age group... A good choice for older elementary or middle grade readers that want a scary but not gory book." — Youth Services Book Review
"[A] relentlessly eerie ghost story... will invest readers from the jump." — Publishers Weekly
School Library Journal
★ 10/06/2023
Gr 4–8—Twelve-year-old Hazel considers herself an amateur detective of sorts, and is planning to start a podcast about mysteries she solves around her town. The cemetery is rumored to be haunted, so when she hears her brother Den and his friends talking about a sneaky game of nighttime hide-and-seek there, she follows him. But when Den's friend Everett doesn't get found by the seeker, and doesn't turn up hours later, Hazel realizes she has a real high-stakes mystery on her hands. As she tries to follow the clues to find Everett, strange and creepy things start to happen. Hazel smells smoke where there isn't any, and they encounter a terrifying presence with red and white clothes and a stitched-up mouth. As Hazel digs into the cemetery's past looking for clues, she uncovers a connection with a horrific accident from many years ago. Can she learn enough to put the ghost to rest and save Everett? Once again, Currie has taken a real-life historical tragedy and created an engaging supernatural tale around those events. Students will be fascinated by the true story outlined in the epilogue. Perfect for young horror fans, there are just enough scares to satisfy without being terrifying. VERDICT Well-written scary novels are few and far between for this age group. All libraries serving middle grades should have this on the shelf.—Mandy Laferriere
Kirkus Reviews
2023-07-13
A 12-year-old girl pits her detective skills against a ghost to find a missing boy.
Despite her parents’ warnings against getting involved in the neighbors’ business and refusal to let her start a mystery-themed podcast, Hazel, who is cued white, can’t quell her passion for sleuthing. When Dennison, her older brother, sneaks out to play hide-and-seek in the cemetery, Hazel secretly follows. There, she hears chilling screams and howling—and is horrified when Den’s friend Everett disappears. The police are called, volunteers form a search party, and Hazel begins to investigate herself, leading her and Den to encounter a terrifying ghost with its mouth sewn shut. Who this ghost is and what drives its actions become the focus of Hazel’s investigation. An occasionally flippant tone undercuts genuinely creepy moments, while the mystery elements inconsistently mesh with the paranormal aspects to produce unfounded assumptions about the haunting. Excessive repetition comes across as not trusting readers’ abilities and insights. Hazel’s superior sleuthing abilities feel unsubstantiated when internet searches that should have occurred earlier in the story immediately yield vital clues late in the novel, and another character presents facts about the cemetery that most people in the community would know. The author’s note describes the real historical events behind the haunting.
A muddled mystery combined with horror elements. (Paranormal. 9-13)
