A Place of Shadows

by David Lafferty

Overview

Ben Wolf is a teen who has always kept his special gift a secret. After all, sharing his ability to sense emotions and see visions of events would he has no way of knowing about would only expose him as a freak. Who needs that? But when Ben and his artist mother inherit the old house in Windward Cove, not only does he discover the small Northern California town has more than its share of ghosts, but he'll soon need all of his abilities to understand the strange things going on around him: The sound of a child's laughter in the vineyard. Overwhelming cold and despair from the room above the attic. An unseen presence that wanders the house at night. A mystery dating back to the 1940s. Most of all, he needs to figure out why his mother is slowly wasting away, obsessed with the gloomy room, the vineyard, and a scene on canvas slowly emerging from her paintbrush. And he needs to do it soon. Before it kills her.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781543951264
Publisher:	BookBaby
Publication date:	10/30/2018
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	466
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

David Lafferty is a veteran of nearly 30 years in the Air Force Reserve, during which he rambled all over the world as a loadmaster on C-5 and C-17 cargo aircraft. He brings his wide range of personal experiences to his storytelling, a passion he has maintained since he was a teen. Dave lives in Dixon, California, and in addition to writing he enjoys camping, cycling, cooking, old books and movies, and most of all, sharing new adventures with Jake, the world's most mellow goldendoodle.

Editorial Reviews

2019-08-27
A debut YA mystery weaves together threads of family and ghosts.

Ben Wolf has always been special, possessing empathic and clairvoyant abilities. Innate knowledge of the emotions of people around him as well as the locations of lost items and the facts of events he hasn't seen has helped him out plenty in the past. But this talent has been hidden from everyone but his mother, as many might see it as freakish or frightening. The story is told from Ben's point of view, and his matter-of-fact voice carries the early exposition and sets up the story effectively. As the narrative tension grows, readers also get a strong sense of his emotions as well as a feeling of immediacy that drives home some of the stranger happenings. Secrecy has allowed Ben to help people avoid disasters more than once, but secrets can also be dangerous or even deadly. When Ben's distant Aunt Claire dies and leaves him and his mom a house in rural Windward Cove, California, their simple life is uprooted in more ways than one. At first, Ben is mostly concerned about starting high school in a new town, and he has little interest in his family ties to Windward Cove's founding. But strange things soon start happening: cold spots, sudden feelings of depression and emptiness, odd laughter or strange voices. Ben needs every bit of his gift to find out why, and fast. Because, worst of all, his happy, outgoing, creative mom seems to be drawn to these haunting occurrences even more than he is, and the more time passes, the more they seem to take from her, until her very life is in jeopardy. Investigating the history of a place is a familiar trope for horror fans, but Ben's powers and his family's connection to the town put a novel spin on this idea and raise the emotional stakes. With solid, action-focused prose to drive Lafferty's story forward, the pages keep turning and the mystery continues to unfold, offering readers of all ages a genuinely engrossing yarn.

Wistful and intriguing, this tale dips its toes in horror but feels like a dream more than a nightmare.

Kirkus Reviews