Go Hunt Me

Paying homage to classic horror movies and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, DeVos’s (Eat Your Heart Out) frightening murder mystery centers high school senior Alex Rush, the only survivor following her and her friends’ deadly stay at a Romanian castle. After she’s wait-listed for the University of Southern California’s prestigious film school, Alex feels that her movie directing dreams are over, especially since her boyfriend was accepted using a recut version of the Dracula-inspired film they made together. When a famous Romanian actress inexplicably offers to sponsor a trip to legendary Castle Prahova, Alex jumps at the opportunity to spend spring break with her friends reshooting her audition reel at the real-life inspiration for Dracula’s home. Filming at the castle, while inspiring, proves dangerous for the aspiring auteurs when a true crime case from the past comes back to haunt—and hunt—the teens. DeVos’s clear passion for and understanding of Stoker’s original buoys this fiendish tale. If thinly rendered characters and predictable plot beats deflate the otherwise pulse-pounding narrative, snappy prose and an appropriately ominous atmosphere abound in this eerie story that begins at its end. Ages 12–up. Agent: Alice Sutherland-Hawes, ASH Literary. (June)