INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES AND INDIE BESTSELLER!
Bestselling author Melissa Albert returns with The Bad Ones, a supernatural horror novel about four mysterious disappearances in a town haunted by a sinister magical history
Goddess, goddess, count to five
In the morning, who’s alive?
In the course of a single winter’s night, four people vanish without a trace across a small town.
Nora’s estranged best friend, Becca, is one of the lost. As Nora tries to untangle the truth of Becca’s disappearance, she discovers a darkness in her town’s past, as well as a string of coded messages Becca left for her to unravel. These clues lead Nora to a piece of local lore: a legendary goddess of forgotten origins who played a role in Nora and Becca’s own childhood games. . . .
An arresting, crossover horror fantasy threaded with dark magic, The Bad Ones is a poison-pen love letter to semi-toxic best friendship, the occult power of childhood play and artistic creation, and the razor-thin line between make-believe and belief.
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Bestselling author Melissa Albert returns with The Bad Ones, a supernatural horror novel about four mysterious disappearances in a town haunted by a sinister magical history
Goddess, goddess, count to five
In the morning, who’s alive?
In the course of a single winter’s night, four people vanish without a trace across a small town.
Nora’s estranged best friend, Becca, is one of the lost. As Nora tries to untangle the truth of Becca’s disappearance, she discovers a darkness in her town’s past, as well as a string of coded messages Becca left for her to unravel. These clues lead Nora to a piece of local lore: a legendary goddess of forgotten origins who played a role in Nora and Becca’s own childhood games. . . .
An arresting, crossover horror fantasy threaded with dark magic, The Bad Ones is a poison-pen love letter to semi-toxic best friendship, the occult power of childhood play and artistic creation, and the razor-thin line between make-believe and belief.
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Praise for this book
"Stunning and immersive, The Bad Ones will entrance you in its hypnotic mythology ruled by the sinister powers of imagination. The real and the imagined collide in this haunting small town mystery shrouded in creeping dread, packed with twists, and brimming with revelations about the nature of good and evil and justice and vengeance. I dare you to put it down!" - Katya de Becerra
"I'm not the first to call Melissa Albert's writing magical and I won't be the last. In this latest, the spell she casts is in the intractable ties that form between girls, the kind that tangle into knots, the kind that make nets that both save and ensnare. Unsettling and unputdownable." - Kendare Blake
"As twisting and intriguing as a puzzle box, The Bad Ones reveals secret after sinister secret, unfolding chilling layers right until the very end. Melissa Albert is a master of the uncanny." - Erin A Craig
"A deliciously dark and twisted labyrinth of a book from the master of YA horror. Peopled with some of the most believable teenage characters I've read, and full of the fervor and sharp edges of teen girl friendships, The Bad Ones had me hooked until the very last page." - Heather Fawcett
"The Bad Ones opens with a terrifying and unsettling sequence of disappearances-and then the tension never relents. With beguiling prose and a simmering sense of dread, the book kept me absolutely spellbound as its darkly supernatural mystery unfolded." - Kate Alice Marshall
"Melissa Albert writes the kind of horror that doesn't just make you check under your bed-it makes you check your own reflection in the mirror. A black-veined, spectral howl of a novel, The Bad Ones cements Albert as the contemporary queen of suburban fantasy." - Ava Reid
"Unholy, vengeful, and utterly captivating. The Bad Ones delivers on Melissa Albert's status as a modern horror master, and burns with a steady, corrosive clarity, not unlike a developing photograph revealing unseen evils." - Ryan La Sala
"The Bad Ones is a slow-burning yet delectable story so sinister I wanted to keep reading it forever. Albert's prose is juicy and sharp, and will haunt you in all the best ways." - Jamison Shea
"Albert seamlessly braids the murky past with the pin-sharp present to create a masterful horror-thriller with a bruised and tender heart." - Laura Steven
"THE BAD ONES is a thrilling reminder of what horror that respects its audience can feel like. This was an addictively terrifying, beautifully vicious book." - Courtney Summers
"The intensity of teen friendships is both fantastical and horrifying in Albert's latest masterpiece. At turns achingly sweet and bitingly vicious-much like its characters-The Bad Ones is a tense, lyrical, and haunting must-read." - Kiersten White
"I'm not the first to call Melissa Albert's writing magical and I won't be the last. In this latest, the spell she casts is in the intractable ties that form between girls, the kind that tangle into knots, the kind that make nets that both save and ensnare. Unsettling and unputdownable." - Kendare Blake
"As twisting and intriguing as a puzzle box, The Bad Ones reveals secret after sinister secret, unfolding chilling layers right until the very end. Melissa Albert is a master of the uncanny." - Erin A Craig
"A deliciously dark and twisted labyrinth of a book from the master of YA horror. Peopled with some of the most believable teenage characters I've read, and full of the fervor and sharp edges of teen girl friendships, The Bad Ones had me hooked until the very last page." - Heather Fawcett
"The Bad Ones opens with a terrifying and unsettling sequence of disappearances-and then the tension never relents. With beguiling prose and a simmering sense of dread, the book kept me absolutely spellbound as its darkly supernatural mystery unfolded." - Kate Alice Marshall
"Melissa Albert writes the kind of horror that doesn't just make you check under your bed-it makes you check your own reflection in the mirror. A black-veined, spectral howl of a novel, The Bad Ones cements Albert as the contemporary queen of suburban fantasy." - Ava Reid
"Unholy, vengeful, and utterly captivating. The Bad Ones delivers on Melissa Albert's status as a modern horror master, and burns with a steady, corrosive clarity, not unlike a developing photograph revealing unseen evils." - Ryan La Sala
"The Bad Ones is a slow-burning yet delectable story so sinister I wanted to keep reading it forever. Albert's prose is juicy and sharp, and will haunt you in all the best ways." - Jamison Shea
"Albert seamlessly braids the murky past with the pin-sharp present to create a masterful horror-thriller with a bruised and tender heart." - Laura Steven
"THE BAD ONES is a thrilling reminder of what horror that respects its audience can feel like. This was an addictively terrifying, beautifully vicious book." - Courtney Summers
"The intensity of teen friendships is both fantastical and horrifying in Albert's latest masterpiece. At turns achingly sweet and bitingly vicious-much like its characters-The Bad Ones is a tense, lyrical, and haunting must-read." - Kiersten White
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