Masterfully paced with well-earned thrills and spooky atmosphere worth sinking into. Malcolm is white, and his best friend is a bisexual Korean American girl. Though the students are predominantly white, Ellery and Ezra are biracial (white and Latinx), and Ezra is gay. Readers will furiously turn pages until the satisfying end. Alternating between Ellery’s and Malcolm’s perspectives, the mystery unfurls at a deliciously escalating pace, filled with believable red herrings and shocking twists. When Ellery’s nominated for homecoming queen, the threats begin to target her and the other princesses, and no matter what he does, Malcolm keeps ending up at the wrong place at the wrong time, making for an easy scapegoat. Disturbing acts of vandalism pop up, threatening a sequel to events at Murderland. All eyes are on the twins as the new kids in town, and Ellery’s pulled between the popular girls and Malcolm Kelly, the younger brother of Declan, Lacey’s boyfriend and the person everyone suspects murdered her. Just five years ago, Lacey Kilduff was found murdered in nearby Murderland, a Halloween theme park. Her own aunt, her mother’s twin, disappeared 23 years ago, never to be found.

True-crime–obsessed Ellery knows the town is infamous for girls going missing. When their mother is suddenly sent to rehab, twins Ellery and Ezra Corcoran are uprooted from California to live with their grandmother in Vermont. History threatens to repeat itself in a small town known for disappearing teen girls.

Karen m mcmanus books