A teen clairvoyant accidentally unlocks a great evil and must stop it before it swallows everything he knows in this propulsive and unsettling YA horror novel set in a small Texas town.
Seventeen-year-old Quinn O'Brien is more than spooked when his older brother, Ollie, brings home a safe from the Alvarado, Gypsum's haunted hotel. Quinn, who has the ability to enter "the Dark Place," an intangible, veiled world where "bits of the future jumble through his mind," has repeatedly had a shared nightmare with his friends June and Selena about the hotel. Selling the antique safe is Ollie's latest "sure thing" to get the pair caught up on the mortgage that he is responsible for since their Gram died and left him the house. But strange visions instead compel Quinn to unlock it, and a man named Kit steps out, thanks Quinn, and walks away. In the days that follow, people go missing and constellations disappear from the sky. Quinn knows he must re-trap Kit--but he also knows that Kit can and will get into his head to stop him.
Sweetest Darkness by Leslie Lutz (Fractured Tide) is eerie and twisted. A magical atmosphere overlays the gorgeous rolling desert landscape where Quinn has grown up, his "first baby blanket" the Milky Way. Fleshing out the town's creepy vibe and Quinn's power are journal entries from the young adults' great-grandfathers recalling strange events, cursed film sets, and in-fighting. Lutz writes well-developed characters, especially Ollie, a deeply loving older brother trying hard to understand Quinn's burden. Quips nestle alongside tragic moments and frightening images, like gnashing, invisible teeth. This novel is at once disturbing and joyous. --Samantha Zaboski, freelance editor and reviewer