Sweetest Darkness

A teenage psychic is drawn deep into the honeycomb of an abandoned hotel--and into a cat-and-mouse game with a predatory entity--in this riveting new supernatural horror novel.

"SO SCARY, IT GIVES DARKNESS A BAD NAME! When I finished the last page, I realized I was still shivering."--R.L. STINE, author of Goosebumps and Fear Street

Everyone in Gypsum, Texas knows the Hotel Alvarado changes at night--especially Quinn. A teenage clairvoyant, he's been having dreams about it... dreams that call him to its dark, abandoned halls. The hotel is a monument to the town's more prosperous past, when celebrities flocked to the mineral spas and films were shot in the desert. The Great Depression killed all of that, it killed the Alvarado, and frankly it killed Gypsum, too. Now, when the sun goes down, things no longer living stir deep within its creaking depths.

But the dreams are relentless. When Quinn braves the hotel's darkness with his best friend June and unrequited love Selena, looking for answers, he gets only one: ghosts aren't the scariest thing lurking inside the Alvarado (although they're there, cold and restless and angry).

No. He's been called by something worse: a predatory, inhuman entity that threatens to wipe Gypsum off the map, along with everyone in it. And wrongly--accidentally--he's let it out. It takes the shape of a handsome young man. It walks. It talks. It laughs. It can even make you laugh. But its appetite for death can never be sated.

Quinn has always had the power to see the future... can he find the power to change it?

Named to the Spirit of Texas Reading List

"Mesmeric. Hauntingly beautiful. A must-read for anyone who dares to venture into the abyss."--Robin Alvarez, author of When Oceans Rise

"Spooky. Scary. Mysterious. Twisty."--A. Lee Martinez, award-winning author of A Namless Witch

Author: Leslie Lutz
Publisher: Holiday House
Published: 09/24/2024
Pages: 304
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.85lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.60w x 1.20d
ISBN: 9780823454945
Audience: Young Adult


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 07/15/2024
Bulletin of Ctr for Child Bks 09/01/2024
Booklist 08/01/2024 pg. 77
School Library Journal 09/01/2024 pg. 112
Shelf Awareness 10/21/2024

About the Author
Leslie Lutz is the author of Sweetest Darkness, a YA horror novel about small towns, cosmic danger, and ravenous spirits, which was named to the Spirit of Texas Reading List and which R.L Stein described as "So scary, it gives darkness a bad name." Her first book, Fractured Tide, was a Suspense Magazine Best Book of the Year and a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection. She lives in the Pacific Northwest, and when she's not writing, you can find her watching B-movies, scuba diving, or taking care of chickens.