Lonely Places - by Kate Anderson (Paperback)

About the Book

Sixteen-year-old Chase wants normalcy--for herself and for her little sister, Guthrie. But when their ever-on-the-move parents relocate them to a lookout in an eerie forest after a traumatic incident, Chase realizes something sinister is after Guthrie and only she seems aware enough to fight it.

Book Synopsis

After a traumatic experience steals her younger sister Guthrie's voice, sixteen-year-old Chase and her family move to an isolated fire lookout in Pando, a grove of Aspen tree clones connected by a massive underground root system. The lookout is supposed to give the family stability after years spent traveling the country in a converted school bus, but all Chase wants is to go back to the hometown they fled eight years ago. When Chase gets a job at a nearby summer camp, she learns that something happened at the lookout, something no one wants to talk about. Chase isn't entirely surprised: Pando is a place where odd things happen, like birds singing on a loop or bones sprouting out of the ground like wildflowers. Worse? Pando is changing Guthrie, and Chase doesn't know how to stop it or even if she should. Despite her resolve to protect Guthrie, Chase becomes increasingly distracted by Wilder, the lifeguard at camp who offers her a taste of normalcy and a new perspective on her skoolie family. But more time with Wilder means less time with Guthrie, and the mysterious force in the forest draws Guthrie deeper into its darkness--until she's nowhere to be found. Chase must face her own childhood trauma and find her way into a strange and sinister world to rescue her sister before Guthrie is lost to the lonely places forever.

Review Quotes

"A riveting great read from start to finish, Lonely Places is an original and entertaining novel delivered in author Kate Anderson's distinctive storytelling style. Having a special appeal to young readers with an interest in novels that have an element of dark fantasy and folklore, Lonely Places is especially and unreservedly recommended for middle school, highschool, and community library YA Fiction collections for ages 14-18." --Midwest Book Review

"Fans of Stranger Things or series involving alternate dimensions will welcome the trippy imagery and life lessons." --The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

"[V]isceral and striking." --Foreword Reviews

"Gorgeous descriptive language brings Pando to life, creating for readers a nearly tangible setting that is functional to the plot. The discord created by the family's collective but unacknowledged trauma haunts them all, creating a slow-burn metaphysical horror with deep reverence for the natural world. . . . A dark and sensory exploration of familial trauma and the effects of grief." --School Library Journal

"A beautifully written, emotionally astute story about confronting trauma, told through a spooky lens." --Kirkus Reviews