Day’s YA: THE BAD ONES

THE BAD ONES by Melissa Albert
9781250894892
2/20/2024
Flatiron Books
Ages 14-18

E-galley available on Edelweiss and NetGalley

Halloween might be over, but if you’re still on the hunt for a perfectly haunting story, look no further. Nora and Becca, once thick as thieves, have been growing apart lately. But when Becca suddenly vanishes one night—along with three other people in their town—Nora immediately drops everything to try to find her friend, delving into the mystery and attempting to unravel the web of clues left behind. One such clue leads her back to her childhood, to a silly game Nora and Becca played once upon a time: The Goddess Game, and the legendary goddess who inspired it. As the secrets leading up to that fateful night are revealed, peculiar things start happening to Nora. She’s sleepwalking, having strange visions, doesn’t recognize herself in the mirror, and has an insatiable craving for sweets. Nora is becoming something dark and sinister, and she might be even more tangled up in the mysterious disappearances than she ever thought possible.

If there was ever a book to read with the lights on, this is it. THE BAD ONES has everything that Melissa Albert does best—intensely complicated female friendships, an intriguingly twisty plot, and darkly lyrical prose—but is by far her most terrifying story yet. The things Nora experiences as she attempts to solve the increasingly peculiar clues left behind by Becca made my skin crawl. The line between make-believe and reality becomes so razor-thin that I was questioning it myself. I’d recommend this to anyone looking for a chilling and riveting supernatural horror, such as THE DEAD AND THE DARK by Courtney Gould, or a dark, atmospheric book steeped in magic, like WAKE THE BONES by Elizabeth Kilcoyne.

Happy reading!
<3 Emily

YA Resources:
Day’s YA Archives
Books for Teens 2024
Adult Books for Teens 2024