A Guide to the Dark

You can check out of Room 9, but you can never leave.

The Haunting of Hill House meets Nina LaCour in this paranormal mystery YA about the ghosts we carry with us.

Something is building, simmering just out of reach.

The room is watching. But Mira and Layla don't know this yet. When the two best friends are stranded on their spring break college tour road trip, they find themselves at the Wildwood Motel, located in the middle of nowhere, Indiana. Mira can't shake the feeling that there is something wrong and rotten about their room. Inside, she's haunted by nightmares of her dead brother. When she wakes up, he's still there.

Layla doesn't see him. Or notice anything suspicious about Room 9. The place may be a little run down, but it has a certain charm she can't wait to capture on camera. If Layla is being honest, she's too preoccupied with confusing feelings for Mira to see much else. But when they learn eight people died in that same room, they realize there must be a connection between the deaths and the unexplainable things that keep happening inside it. They just have to find the connection before Mira becomes the ninth.

Readers won't be able to put down this tender thriller that includes over thirty interior black and white photos by the author!

Author: Meriam Metoui
Publisher: Henry Holt & Company
Published: 07/18/2023
Pages: 368
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.95lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.50w x 1.30d
ISBN: 9781250863218
Audience: Young Adult


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 05/15/2023
Publishers Weekly 05/22/2023
Booklist 06/01/2023 pg. 78
Bulletin of Ctr for Child Bks 07/01/2023
School Library Journal 09/01/2023 pg. 116