It Found Us
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- $8.99
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- $8.99
Publisher Description
From the author of Scritch Scratch and The Girl in White comes a new spooky mystery about a girl detective who must decode a series of ominous clues tied to a century-old tragedy to find a missing teenager before it’s too late…
Twelve-year-old Hazel Woods has always had an unusual knack for sleuthing. Some may call it snooping, but all she really wants is to solve mysteries around town. So, when she not-so-accidentally overhears her brother Den planning to sneak into the cemetery at night for an epic game of hide-and-seek, she decides to secretly tag along. This seems like the perfect opportunity to investigate the claims that the cemetery is haunted.
But the moment the game ends, Hazel realizes something is very, very wrong. From her hiding spot in the bushes, she overhears that her brother’s best friend, Everett, is missing. Everyone else was found by the seeker but there’s no sign of Everett anywhere. It’s as if he just . . . vanished
Hazel and Den are determined to find Everett before it’s too late. But as they begin to unravel the terrifying clues that started appearing since that night in the graveyard–eerie whispers that sound like someone counting, the intermittent smell of smoke, and the cold, lost presence that follows them everywhere, she’s not sure what they are dealing with. But Everett needs more than search parties and scent-tracking dogs to find him, especially if his disappearance is tied to the history of the cemetery, and the lost, century-old spirits that might still be trapped there . . .
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
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.
