The Bell Tolls at Traeger Hall

A mansion is riddled with decades of deadly secrets in Wright’s chilling latest (after Specters in the Glass House). The narrative unspools across two timelines; in the 19th century, as Waverly Pembrooke grapples with the grisly murder of her uncle Leopold Traeger, whose Newton Creek, Wis., estate has been her home for years. When it turns out Leopold’s will stipulates the immediate closure of Trager Hall, leaving Waverly without a place to stay, she teams up with local undertaker Titus Fitzgerald to uncover the truth about the murder. The present-day timeline follows Jennie Philips after she inherits the now-crumbling mansion from her father. She’s eager to sell—until she discovers a dead body on the property, stoking her curiosity and prompting her to enlist the help of Newton Creek native Zane Harris to dig into the mansion’s dark past. As Jennie and Zane wrestle with whether to open Traeger Hall’s doors for the first time in more than a century, anonymous threats against Zane’s family compel them to summon their faith and ask the same question Waverly did in 1890: What lies within Traeger Hall that causes people to kill? Wright skillfully wraps both timelines around the same intriguing mystery, seeding the plot with enough curveballs to keep readers turning pages. Lovers of gothic fiction will be hooked. (Oct.)