by Ana Reyes
First published 2023
Maya watched her best friend Aubrey collapse and die in front of Frank, the mysterious man they had spent the summer with during their senior year of high school. Seven years later, Maya lives in Boston, battling a secret addiction while trying to forget the gaps in her memory from that terrible time. When she discovers a YouTube video showing another young woman dying suddenly in a diner across from Frank, Maya's carefully constructed life crumbles. She returns to her hometown in the Berkshires to piece together what really happened that summer. At her mother's house, she searches through fragments of her past and finds hidden messages in her deceased Guatemalan father's book that she never noticed before. As Maya relives the jealousy that nearly destroyed her friendship with Aubrey and recalls Frank's strange influence over them both, she realizes she must decode her father's story to save herself. Time runs short as all paths lead back to Frank's cabin in the woods.
Genres: suspense, mystery, contemporary, psychological-thriller
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, intimate, suspenseful
Tropes: past-haunts-present, secrets, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Boston, Berkshires
Period: Senior Year of High School, 7 Years Later
321 pages · Hardcover · Dutton
Content warnings: addiction, depression, mental-illness