Gr 9 Up-A school hiking trip turns deadly in Richards's dark, contemporary stand-alone thriller. Participation in a hike through the West Virginia woods is mandatory for graduating high school seniors. Sera's misery is compounded by Lucas, the crush she's avoided. A flash flood strands the campers and their teachers Mr. Walker and Ms. Brighton on either side of a river. The next day, Sera wakes up from a drugged sleep, discovering evidence that the campers were attacked. Mr. Walker is found unconscious, and the campers are marked on their wrists: Jude, Deceptive ; Emily, Damaged ; Lucas, Dangerous ; and Sera, Darling . Someone is targeting them for crimes, imagined or real, and they must work together to survive the hunt. Richards delivers a solid page-turner for readers who want to keep the lights on all night. With its predatory atmosphere, this book feels like The Breakfast Club folded into a Christopher Pike novel's fight for survival. The characters' ethnicities are refreshingly inclusive. However, the plot suffers from a weakness that holds it back from rising above average. The backstory behind the attack is based on a ghostly tale that readers are never sufficiently privy to, weakening the tension and at times causing actual confusion. The attacks are quite graphic and may be unsuitable for sensitive readers. VERDICT An enticing thriller that, despite some defects, remains a general purchase recommendation. Jessica Bushore, formerly at Shelf Awareness, Xenia, OH

Sera is a reluctant attendee on a mandatory senior field trip with a back-to-nature theme, a prospect made even more daunting by the fact that one of the other seniors attending is Lucas, a boy with whom she has a complicated past. Soon, none of that will seem important because she and the other students wake after their first night to find that they have been drugged and somebody has been in their tents. Each one of them has a word written on their arm in permanent marker, and their teacher is drugged and still unconscious. What follows is a high-tension game of cat and mouse, filled with fear, suspicion, and danger.Richards specializes in thrillers for teens, and her latest might be her sharpest effort yet. Readers will be faced with mysteries, having to discern genuine clues from red herrings to see if they can figure out who is behind the peril. This book is a gripping read, filled with plenty of action, and sure to appeal to reluctant readers.Sean Rapacki.