Claire Legrand

Sarah Watts

Practically-perfect twelve-year-old Victoria Wright must lie, sneak, and break the rules when her investigation of the disappearance of her best--and only--friend, Lawrence, reveals dark secrets about her town and the orphanage run by the reclusive Mrs. Cavendish.

The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls

Kim Tyo-Dickerson

Victoria is practically perfect in every way, much to the envious disdain of her classmates in Belleville where being beautiful and getting perfect grades really do matter most and there is desperate competition to be the best. Alienated from the other girls by her sharp mind and tongue, not to mention the golden curls she loves to toss, and focused solely on her perfect grades, Victoria still manages to take pity on her classmate Lawrence, being strangely drawn to him and happy that he lets her be in charge. Victoria makes him a project, realizing begrudgingly over the years that he is her only real friend, and tries to help him be more "normal" and not so obsessed with his piano and daydreaming and being perennially messy from his hair with the silver streak to his sloppy clothing. She constantly wonders why are they friends at all, as she has no time for nonsense or drama. But they are all the same.

Then Lawrence goes missing. Then Victoria starts to notice that things in Belleville are too perfect somehow, although she loves being serious and perfect so very much. What happened to Lawrence? When she tries to find out, she is drawn to The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls, a house and grounds where children are not seen and definitely not heard, where sometimes a child re-emerges from its doors and returns to their family fixed and perfect or...they don't return at all. And any adult who tries to help the children be themselves, think unique thoughts, express unique talents disappear as well.

This is a deep, dark, and twisted middle grade horror story with a heroine who has the One-Salty-Hair-Toss-To-Rule-Them-All, yet finds her courage and resilience when it matters despite her need for perfect control. There are monsters here, adults who fail miserably to protect their children, a house that crawls with skittering dread. There are punishments and unlikely allegiances, betrayal and revenge. Think Coraline and Miss Peregrine's, think Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland and Angela Carter's The Magic Toyshop. Hand this to middle school horror fans, they won't be disappointed!

The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls

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