What Stays Buried
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
A Bram Stoker Award nominee! In her first book for middle grade readers, New York Times bestselling author Suzanne Young brings together a thrilling ghost story, a heartfelt coming of age journey, and a poignant reminder that those we’ve loved and lost are never far away—perfect for fans of Bone Hollow and The Peculiar Incident on Shady Street.
Twelve-year-old Calista Wynn will lose her ability to speak with the dead on her thirteenth birthday.
And with only a few weeks left, children have started going missing in this chilling supernatural mystery.
When Calista meets the Tall Lady—an angry spirit with a grudge against Calista, her family of psychics, and the entire town—she knows she’s found the ghost responsible for the disappearances.
It’s up to Calista, the only one who can see the Tall Lady, to stop her. If she doesn’t, Calista won’t just lose her powers…she’ll lose everyone she has left.
A Race Against Time: Calista’s ability to see ghosts disappears on her thirteenth birthday. With the date looming and an evil spirit on the loose, she has only days to solve the mystery before her unique gift is gone for good.Family Curse: It’s happened to every medium in the Wynn family. At thirteen, their powers vanish. Now Calista must confront the dark history behind the curse if she wants to save her sister and her town.A Spooky Small Town: In the sinking town of Meadowmere, children are vanishing. An angry ghost called the Tall Lady is to blame, and she has a personal grudge against Calista’s entire family.A Brave Girl Hero: Only Calista can see the terrifying Tall Lady. It’s up to her to face the vengeful spirit, protect those she loves, and confront what stays buried before she loses everything.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In her middle grade debut, Young (the Girls with Sharp Sticks series) spins a high-stakes, fast-moving ghost story emphasizing intergenerational family connections. Twelve-year-old medium Calista Wynn inherited both her family's gift for communing with the dead and the family curse that will cause her to lose that power on her 13th birthday, the age her aunt Virginia died. Dreading the approaching birthday, which will also strip her of the ability to maintain a relationship with her late father and grandmother, Calista encounters a new terror when Edwina Swift, the ghost of Virginia's murderer, returns to exact revenge on the descendants of the town vigilantes who executed her. As Edwina abducts children and churns up a powerful dark spell, Calista races against her fading gift to stop Edwina before she can claim her next intended victim, Calista's younger sister—the youngest Wynn girl with the family powers. Young employs spine-tingling horror tropes to drum up suspense, pitting a stock villain against a heroic magical family to drive the plot toward its reckoning. A consequential magic system facilitates explorations of grief and closure after loss. Characters default to white. Ages 8–12.
