Former crime reporter turned NAACP Image Award-nominated multi-genre author L.S. Stratton dives into the YA world with her debut horror novel, Sundown Girls. In the book, a Black teen named Naomi is reunited with her biological family after being abducted by a stranger as an infant. Naomi struggles with their reunion, as she rejects her birth name and refers to her birth parents by their first names. Her journey includes therapy and secretly writing letters to the woman who kidnapped her, who’s incarcerated, while dealing with public scrutiny because her story was a fixture in national media. As her parents try to bring the family closer, they decide to vacation in a small Virginia town with a questionable history, where Naomi encounters a ghost who needs her help. PW spoke with the author about her career as a crime reporter and how that impacts her fiction, which blends historical happenings and genre-bending horror.

Your book shines a light on the often hidden histories of sundown towns across America. Are there some new things you uncovered while researching this book?

What was fascinating is that I didn’t realize how many major cities used to be sundown towns [places that purposely barred minorities]. Also, [the concept of] sundown towns, at least in terms of the Black community, is well-known. [However], I did not know that so many other minorities had a similar legacy of sundown towns, especially Native Americans out West. If Natives were [seen] after dark, they could run the risk of being beaten or tortured.

What subgenres of horror do you believe Sundown Girls lands in? And what drew you to these sorts of horror elements?

I would say paranormal, just as an overall theme, because of the ghosts. But there has been an emerging sub-genre of social commentary, where the horror is used to represent something. I [tend to] gravitate toward those stories. Yes, I want titillation. I want [readers to think] “Oh, that’s terrifying.”

When you’re reporting on crime, you’re going to get a gamut of characters, especially people society traditionally sees as bad people, but when you’re researching them and getting their backstory, you start to humanize or see how multifaceted people are. And so for me, when I write stories, especially when I write mysteries and thrillers, I don’t like to do the Snidely Whiplash villain. Sometimes it’s even empathetic; I want readers to understand that these are bad people, but bad people who were led in this direction by a myriad of factors.

Naomi is a complicated and traumatized teen. Was this your intention from the beginning, or did her character develop as you progressed with the book?

I always wanted to make her morally conflicted, because I do not gravitate toward characters that are very straightforward. I prefer ones that have some complexity to them. Naomi’s backstory [is] inspired by a true story I saw years ago, which I thought was fascinating. Most people think, “Oh, they’re reunited, and they’re so happy.” But for [Naomi], she doesn’t know these people and doesn’t have a sense of place. So I wanted her to already be off kilter when the story starts. She has her antennas up because all of these things happening around her are making her uneasy.

A lot of times in horror, when people are already in an unstable situation, it can ramp up the drama. So the correlation between her being a missing girl made her psychically more open to other missing people throughout that town. These spirits can see something in her that the average person can’t see; they get that sense that she’s lost.

With reunification being one of the themes in Naomi’s journey, how did you find the balance between her relationships with her caregivers?

As a mother, it was important to me to present both perspectives. I knew that from Naomi’s perspective, [her kidnapper] is the only mother that she knows. Her kidnapper was never cruel to her. We get hints that Naomi was isolated for obvious reasons, but her abductor was also protective. She homeschooled her. She wanted her to be happy, so [from the kidnapper’s perspective] she looks like a great mom. As a parent, I wanted to show the harm and tremendous pain the abductor caused. The parents are trying their best to create the bond, but it’s obvious that the connection period that’s integral to building relationships with kids when they’re young was ripped away from them and they’re angry about it. They love her deeply, but she’s [thinking], “The person you love isn’t me. You remember the nine-month-old— I’m not that person. My mom saw me grow into the person I am and loves me, so I would like you to respect her.” Her parents know that’s impossible, which is why they constantly butt heads.

Sundown Girls by Carroll. Penguin/Paulsen, $19.99 Jan. 27 ISBN 978-1-933060-56-9