Ben Guterson

Danger, intrigue, and the power of family combine in The Winterhouse Mysteries, the fast-paced conclusion to Ben Guterson and Chloe Bristol's illustrated, enchanting Winterhouse middle grade trilogy. It’s springtime at Winterhouse and Elizabeth is settling into the joyful chaos of her new home. But it isn’t long before she and Freddy are drawn into an ominous new mystery. Guests at the hotel start behaving oddly, and Elizabeth’s powers manifest in thrilling—sometimes frightening—new ways. As unnatural tremors shake the foundations of Winterhouse, Elizabeth hears cries for help from Gracella Winters, a villain she’d thought dead and gone for good. Elizabeth’s discovery of a rare book containing secrets of an ancient ritual leads to a tragic realization: someone at the hotel is trying to help Gracella rise again. Can Elizabeth and Freddy banish these threats and protect the future of Winterhouse once and for all? Christy Ottaviano Books

The Winterhouse Mysteries

Sarah Sammis

The Winterhouse Mysteries by Ben Guterson and Chloe Bristol is the conclusion of the Winterhouse series. Elizabeth has settled into a happy routine at her new home. She's excited to hear Freddy will be here for Easter, as will the two men who have been working on the puzzle.

But her powers are acting up and some of the guests are acting strange too. Elizabeth suspects Gracella Winters is trying one last time to come back from the dead. There is one last item that can grant that wish. Elizabeth and Freddy want to find that item and stop Gracella from using it.

33CC99 - family uhoria labyrinth

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Kim Tyo-Dickerson

There is an unsettling, unstoppable big bad at the center of this atmospheric series, and the last book doesn't disappoint when the foundations of the opulent Winterhouse hotel literally begin to shake and a red haze emerges on the landscape where malevolent Gracella Falls has been entombed, neither dead nor alive. The Falls family, owners of Winterhouse, have many dark secrets and broken hearts in its storied past and now it is up to Elizabeth, newly discovered heir to the Winterhouse hotel, and her inventive friend Freddy to unravel the last hidden piece of the puzzle, find a cure for their friend Alana who had her young life drained from her in the last book and is now bedridden as an elderly woman, and stop Gracella from returning to destroy Winterhouse once and for all. The Winterhouse library, reading, and research play key roles again in decoding the many clues left in the hotel by notorious visitors and eccentric family members who dabbled in the dark arts. There are archives, diaries, paintings, secret compartments, newly discovered letters, rare editions of long out of print books, and encrypted clues all over the hotel, many that have remained unsolved for years and which Elizabeth's grandfather, Norbridge, and the Winterhouse librarian, Leona, have not been able, or willing?, to solve. Elizabeth and Freddy's love of all word play, anagrams and palindromes in particular, set the stage for the final confrontation between Elizabeth and those that would like to destroy Winterhouse and the Falls family forever. 

One of the great pleasures in reading this series is that that books are illustrated throughout by Chloe Bristol, with moody intermissions in the story, double-page spreads punctuating major revelations, and a funky, Edward Gorey-esque vibe to the characters' angular faces and bodies, large expressive hands and elegant fingers, with flat interior and exterior settings that accentuate the gothic themes. The hardcovers are particularly lovely, with the dust jacket's cozy interior menaced by Gracella in profile with glowing red eyes and the two windows cut out and peeking out onto a snowy expanse in front of the hotel where Norbridge and Alana stand, vulnerable, outside the hotel.

The Winterhouse Mysteries

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