In this exciting horror thriller, Marin, 14, her blind twin brother, Kana, and their parents live on an island that has 14 years of constant sun, or "Day," followed by 14 years of continuous darkness ight." Residents must sail to the Desert Lands to live for 14 years until Day returns and they can go back. Before departing, the townspeople perform odd rituals like sprinkling lime around their houses and removing the doors' locks. Marin questions why they do this, but no adult will explain. After Kana and his orphaned friend Line are accidentally left behind, they discover they are not alone: terrifying creatures inhabit the town during Night and kill anyone they find. As Kana and Line desperately struggle to survive and find a way off the island, secrets they are keeping from each other threaten to tear them apart. This fast-paced story relies more on psychological suspense than graphic horror as it effectively alternates between Marin's, Kana's, and Line's perspectives and emphasizes self-reliance and the unbreakable bonds between family and friends.

Gr 6 Up-In the bucolic village of Bliss, residents are hurriedly packing and cleaning their houses for their seasonal migration to another island. In this case, seasonal is every 14 years, and a first-time event for fraternal twins, Marin and her brother, Kana. Soon to be picked up in boats by furriers, the families are urgently trying to beat the receding tide that denotes the beginning of a long freeze that human inhabitants would not survive. Hints that less hospitable creatures take over the town in the off-season make it imperative that everyone board the boats, but when Marin loses her sunstone necklace in the woods, her boyfriend, Line, naively runs off to find it. Fatefully, all three are left behind as darkness and cold temperatures descend in this cycle of night. Marin's dark complexion differs dramatically from her pale-skinned twin, and Kana's eyesight, which once blinded him in sunlight, now becomes an asset in the darkness. Upon finding Line, the trio searches for a boat they believe is hidden on the island, their only hope of escape. Suspense builds as Line is injured, creatures emerge from the shadows, and Kana holds a dark secret about his birth from the two of them. Magical realism combine with elements of a medieval survival story, as the teens ward off gangrene with herbal poultices and fight off witchlike creatures. VERDICT A mildly satisfying, stand-alone read for middle school horror lovers. Vicki Reutter, State University of New York at Cortland