First published 2024
Three college students pile into their car in 1983 with cameras and high hopes for their American Studies documentary on roadside memorials. The week-long trip through Appalachian backroads starts as pure adventure. They share stories around campfires and cruise empty highways, filming the crosses and flowers that mark where drivers died. But the deeper they travel into the mountains, the more unsettling their project becomes. Memorial after memorial bears the same strange symbol. Locals watch them with hostile eyes. Someone follows their car down dark roads. Their vehicle shows signs of tampering each morning. The random accidents that created these roadside shrines start looking anything but random. The students realize they have stumbled onto something that people will kill to protect. Their documentary project becomes a fight for survival as they uncover the sinister truth behind the deaths that dot these mountain roads.
Genres: adventure, mystery, horror, thriller
Vibes: dark, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: fight-for-survival, found-family
Setting: Appalachia
Period: 1983
472 pages · Hardcover · Gallery Books
Content warnings: violence