A Place for Vanishing

Starred review from October 16, 2023
Hoping for a fresh start after her suicide attempt and recent bipolar III diagnosis, 16-year-old Libby Feldman and her family move into her mother’s childhood home, which has been abandoned since the tragic deaths of Libby’s maternal grandparents. Established by spiritualist Ellen Clery in 1894 as the House of Masks, Libby’s new abode—a crumbling Victorian mansion that boasts a hedge maze of blue roses, disturbing insect-themed stained-glass windows, and a history of mysterious disappearances—is a fixture in local legend. Despite her mother’s efforts to enforce normalcy, Libby enlists the help of her 13-year-old sister Vivi and her neighbor, 16-year-old Flynn Driscoll, to investigate the secrets surrounding the property and the masks that Madame Clery left behind. As the trio delves into the dark pasts of the house’s former residents, they discover that the sinister truth about the masks is tangled in their own buried traumas. Fraistat wields deeply unsettling prose and evocative insect theming to craft an expertly woven narrative that is both a frightening slow-burn psychological thriller and a nuanced and touching exploration of the complicated aftermath of trauma. Libby and Flynn cue as white; Vivi is half Black and half white. Age 12–up. Agent: Christa Heschke, McIntosh & Otis.