The Spirit Bares Its Teeth

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!
A Stonewall Honor Book in Young Adult Literature!

A blood-soaked and nauseating triumph that cuts like a scalpel and reads like your darkest nightmare.

New York Times bestselling author Andrew Joseph White returns with the transgressive gothic horror of our time!

Mors vincit omnia. Death conquers all.

London, 1883. The Veil between the living and dead has thinned. Violet-eyed mediums commune with spirits under the watchful eye of the Royal Speaker Society, and sixteen-year-old trans, autistic Silas Bell would rather rip out his violet eyes than become an obedient Speaker wife.

After a failed attempt to escape an arranged marriage, Silas is diagnosed with Veil sickness--a mysterious disease sending violet-eyed women into madness--and shipped away to Braxton's Finishing School and Sanitorium. When the ghosts of missing students start begging Silas for help, he decides to reach into Braxton's innards and expose its guts to the world--so long as the school doesn't break him first.

Featuring an autistic trans protagonist in a historical setting, Andrew Joseph White's much-anticipated sophomore novel does not back down from exposing the violence of the patriarchy and the harm inflicted on trans youth who are forced into conformity.

A Stonewall Honor Book in Young Adult Literature
Selected for the Rise: Feminist Book List
Named to the ALA Rainbow List
Named a Best Book of the Year by Shelf Awareness, School Library Journal, Kirkus Reviews, and more!
A Chicago Public Library 'Best of the Best' Book
A Locus Award Finalist
A BCCB Blue Ribbon Book!
A Booklist Editors' Choice

Author: Andrew Joseph White
Publisher: Peachtree Teen
Published: 09/05/2023
Pages: 400
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.01lbs
Size: 8.60h x 5.46w x 1.38d
ISBN: 9781682636114
Audience: Young Adult

Accelerated Reader:
Reading Level: 4.8
Point Value: 14
Interest Level: Upper Grade
Quiz #/Name: 523037 / Spirit Bares Its Teeth


Award: Stonewall Book Award - Honor Book


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 07/15/2023
Booklist 08/01/2023 pg. 70
Publishers Weekly 08/28/2023
Bulletin of Ctr for Child Bks 09/01/2023 - Book Of Special Distinction
Shelf Awareness 11/21/2023
Horn Book Magazine 11/01/2023 pg. 91
School Library Journal 02/16/2024 pg. 1
Hornbook Guide to Children 07/01/2023 - Superior,Well Above Average

About the Author
Andrew Joseph White is a queer, trans author from Virginia, where he grew up falling in love with monsters and wishing he could be one too. He received his MFA in Creative Writing from George Mason University in 2022 and has a habit of cuddling random street cats. Andrew writes about trans kids with claws and fangs, and what happens when they bite back.