Heartwood Box by Ann Aguirre
Series n/a; standalone
Genre Young Adult Romantic Thriller
Publisher Tor Teen
Publication Date July 8, 2019
Amazon https://amzn.to/2JdBNEm
Kobo http://bit.ly/2JpULX1
Barnes & Noble http://bit.ly/2xAbNw4
iBooks https://apple.co/32b7yFC
Series n/a; standalone
Genre Young Adult Romantic Thriller
Publisher Tor Teen
Publication Date July 8, 2019
Amazon https://amzn.to/2JdBNEm
Kobo http://bit.ly/2JpULX1
Barnes & Noble http://bit.ly/2xAbNw4
iBooks https://apple.co/32b7yFC
Heartwood Box is a dark, romantic YA suspense novel
with an SF edge from New York Times bestselling author Ann Aguirre…
In this tiny, terrifying town, the lost are never
found.
When Araceli Flores Harper is sent to stay with her
great-aunt Ottilie in her ramshackle Victorian home, the plan is simple. She’ll
buckle down and get ready for college. Life won’t be exciting, but she’ll cope,
right?
Wrong. From the start, things are very, very wrong. Her
great-aunt still leaves food for the husband who went missing twenty years ago,
and local businesses are plastered with MISSING posters. There are unexplained
lights in the woods and a mysterious lab just beyond the city limits that the
locals don’t talk about. Ever. When she starts receiving mysterious letters
that seem to be coming from the past, she suspects someone of pranking her or
trying to drive her out of her mind.
To solve these riddles and bring the lost home again,
Araceli must delve into a truly diabolical conspiracy, but some secrets fight
to stay buried…
Enjoy this excerpt:
CHAPTER ONE
This is where hope goes to die.
That’s what I’m thinking as I step off the train onto the
sparse platform. There’s absolutely nothing here, not even a ticket machine,
let alone someone I can ask for directions. Few people were left on the LIRR
when I got off here, though one woman did flash me a glance like she was asking
if I was sure.
I’m really not.
The area gives off a strange vibe, rural but also
industrial, with green fields interspersed with machinery and equipment. It’s a
bit too far to walk to my great-aunt’s house where I’ll be staying for the next
year, but I planned to get a cab when I arrived. I assured my parents I’d be
fine—they could proceed to Venezuela without worrying about me—but now I’m
having second thoughts.
It’s not late, just past four, but there’s nobody in sight.
A shiver crawls over me, nerves and exhaustion. I’ve had a long-ass day,
beginning with a tearful parting from my folks in front of an OXXO at Benito
Juarez Airport in Mexico City, then a six-hour flight to JFK, immigration,
customs, baggage claim, then two more hours on two different trains. I’m so
tired, and the quiet here is eerie. I’m so not used to being alone.
As I walk along the platform, MISSING posters flutter in the
breeze, drawing my eye. The way I understand it, this is a small town. Why are
there so many flyers up? It’s not just children either. Grown men and women,
teenagers, little kids as well. I stop to read one of them at random. Ronell
Leon Salazar, age 11, last seen …
The chill doesn’t go away as the wind kicks up. I’ve been
warned about international data usage, but I have to turn it on long enough to
use a ride-sharing app. There’s a driver ten minutes away who can pick me up,
and I wait on the platform without seeing another soul, just the flutter of
those MISSING posters to keep me company.
It’s funny how technology has changed the caution our parents
tried to instill in us as little kids. Don’t get in the car with strangers! But
I’m doing that as my driver rolls up and I ID him based on data from the app.
He doesn’t say much, only takes me past a lumberyard and a lot where police
vehicles are repaired. By car, I’m only fifteen minutes from my great-aunt’s
place, but it would’ve taken me forever to walk.
The town isn’t much to look at, and it gives off a strange,
old-fashioned air, like time stopped here fifty years ago and they’d rather
keep it that way. The driver lets me out in front of a ramshackle Victorian
monster house that stares me down with its dirty windows. I gaze up at the
peeling violet paint and the chipped stained-glass windows, the overgrown ivy
digging into the walls.
This is the kind of neighborhood where I shouldn’t loiter.
There’s not much space between these historic houses, and a curtain is
fluttering next door, a sign I’m being watched. Soon, somebody will ask what my
business is here. To avoid that on my first day, I gather my courage, hoist my
belongings, and mount the four steps to the sagging porch.
Before I can knock, the door flies open, and an old woman
stands staring at me. I never cared for Charles Dickens, but this woman
could’ve stepped straight out of Great Expectations. I almost say, “Miss
Havisham?” but there’s no reason to piss off my guardian first thing.
“Um, hi,” I start, but she cuts me off with a Venus flytrap
of a hug, just all snap and here I am, against her bony bosom, breathing in
talcum powder and lilac.
She’s a tall woman, thin and gristly, with papery skin and
lipstick bleeding into the cracks around her mouth.
“No introductions are necessary,” she says, pushing me back
to arm’s length for deeper scrutiny. “You can only be Araceli, dear Simone’s
daughter. You’re quite like your mother in your features, but you’ve got your
father’s coloring.”
None of that is wrong, but it sounds strange, and I don’t
know if it’s supposed to be a compliment. Still, I say, “Thank you,” just in
case it is.
“Did you have any trouble getting here?” she asks, ushering
me into the house that time forgot.
I don’t mean it in a cruel way, but everything is just so
faded and dated that it feels as if I’ve stepped back in time. Not even to the
fifties like I thought about the rest of the town, more like 1917, when the
Victorians gasped their last breaths and ladies cut off their hair and learned
to smoke cigarettes. I take in the worn carpet and the peeling wallpaper in
discreet glances, hoping she won’t realize how creeped out I already am.
This is such a tall, narrow house, and the old wood has a
distinctive, musty smell. I’m not used to that. We always lived in small
two-bedroom places, whatever we could find for rent closest to the town center.
The walls were usually solid, cement or block, built to stand against
earthquakes or bombardment. I can’t remember ever living in a freestanding
house. There will be no rooftop garden parties here, no barbeques that draw out
the neighbors so that we grill whatever’s on hand and I take beer from the cooler
without anyone asking how old I am.
“No. I took the train from the airport.” More than one, but
she probably knows that, if she’s ever visited NYC.
That’s the most appealing aspect of living here. This hamlet
has less than six thousand people, most of them white, but after a couple hours
on the train, I can be in New York City. There will probably be all kinds of
fun things to do on weekends, if Great-Aunt Ottilie gives me some latitude.
Now she’s staring at my luggage like she wants to hug me
again. “Oh dear. Is this all you have?”
I glance at my single suitcase and backpack. Moving once a
year is a wonderful way to streamline your worldly goods. “Yeah, that’s it.
Could you show me where I’ll be staying? And thanks for having me.”
“It’s truly my pleasure. I’m a bit set in my ways, after
living alone for so long, but I hope we’ll get along well.”
I’m curious how long she’s been alone—and why. She starts up
the stairs slowly, showing signs that she has a bad hip, and I immediately feel
guilty. “It’s fine, you can just tell me, you don’t have to—”
“Nonsense. My room is downstairs, so once I get you settled,
I won’t be traipsing up here to bother you often. Let’s attend to the
formalities and then be good housemates, shall we?” Great-Aunt Ottilie flashes
a smile over her shoulder.
Okay, maybe I can deal with her.
To celebrate the release of HEARTWOOD BOX by Ann Aguirre
we're giving away a $25 Amazon gift card to one lucky winner!
LINK: http://bit.ly/2JrJlCa
GIVEAWAY TERMS & CONDITIONS: Open to
internationally. One winner will receive a $25 Amazon gift card. This giveaway
is administered by Pure Textuality PR on behalf of Ann Aguirre. Giveaway ends
7/13/2019 @ 11:59pm EST.
NY Times and USA Today bestselling author ANN AGUIRRE has been a clown, a clerk, a savior of stray kittens, and a voice actress, not necessarily in that order. She grew up in a yellow house across from a cornfield, but now she lives in Mexico with her husband and children. She writes all manner of genre fiction for adults and teens.
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