Hotel Ruby

October 12, 2015
Young's (The Remedy) unsubtle paranormal novel follows 17-year-old Audrey and what remains of her family after her mother's sudden death a few months earlier. Staying with her brother and father at the luxurious Hotel Ruby, en route to live with her grandmother, Audrey falls for charming fellow guest Elias and feels happiness for the first time in months. However, the hotel is rumored to be haunted, and the hostile concierge seems overly concerned with Audrey's every move. In a shocking climax, Audrey makes an irrevocable choice, and the narrative ignores conventional definitions of happy and unhappy endings. Audrey's unresolved guilt for her behavior toward her boyfriend Ryan, with whom she has fallen out of love while lacking the courage to break up with him, is handled well, but her first-person narrative is sometimes marred by on-the-nose descriptions of characters' motivations and emotional states ("My brother straightens in his chair, knocked sideways by the fact that our father would criticize him now"). A promising story that falls short. Ages 14âup. Agent: Jim McCarthy, Dystel & Goderich Literary Management.

August 15, 2015
Audrey knows her father is grief-stricken over the death of her mother, but abandoning her and her brother at the home of a grandmother they hardly know is almost unforgivable. So when the family stops to rest at the luxurious and extravagant Hotel Ruby, Audrey makes the most of her last night of freedom. She sneaks into the hotel's "anniversary party"-an invitation-only event-where she meets and falls head over heels for the charming Elias Lange, a longtime resident of the Ruby. But Audrey's passion for Elias isn't enough to distract her from the nagging feeling that things at the Ruby just aren't quite right: haunting music drifts down the corridor of the 13th floor, where Audrey is staying; the concierge is both ominous and seemingly omniscient; and some guests are not enthusiastic about attending the invitation-only anniversary parties that seem to occur every night. The haunted-hotel plot is not entirely original, and some readers may predict the ending after reading the first 30 pages. However, Young accurately captures each resident's grief, thus populating her novel with three-dimensional characters whom readers will appreciate. While fans of supernatural-romance may want to give this The Shining-meets-The Great Gatsby book a try, readers looking for a less-transparent plot and a more-complicated mystery would do better to look elsewhere. (Horror. 14-18)

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November 1, 2015

Gr 9 Up-Grief-stricken Audrey Casella and her family arrive at the glamorous Hotel Ruby after an exhausting, strained car ride. The recent death of Audrey's mother has devastated her father. Audrey and her brother try to watch out for each other, but the journey has been an arduous one. They are not happy about being sent to live with their grandmother. When a sign announces that a hotel is close by, their father decides that they will stay one night and continue on in the morning. However, there is more to the Ruby than they expected, and as one night turns into several days, Audrey and what's left of her family seem to begin to heal. The place is restful, engaging, glamorous, and strange. It has a ghostly past. Every night certain guests are invited to an elegant party commemorating a fire that killed dozens of people. Audrey is not invited, but her father and her brother both receive invitations. She spends her time exploring and making friends. The sweet housekeeper, Lourdes, and the intriguing Elias Lange take her in and show her around. Unfortunately, the more she learns, the more threatening the hotel becomes, which culminates in a bone-chilling revelation. Despite some choppy phrasing, this novel is a fast and fun read. VERDICT A great purchase for libraries where paranormal mysteries circulate well.-Claire Covington, Broadway High School, VA

Copyright 2015 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 15, 2015
Grades 9-12 Young follows up her New York Times best-selling series with a stand-alone title that straddles the line between suspense and horror. Three months after her mother's death, Audrey is en route to her grandmother's house, along with her brother, Daniel, because their dad just can't handle them anymore. But their fractured family makes an unexpected stop at the historic, beautiful, and supposedly haunted Hotel Ruby. One night turns into two, as her family falls under the spell of the place, and Audrey falls for the dreamy Elias. But when Audrey learns the real reason people stay so long at Hotel Ruby, she's forced to make a difficult decision: Does she want to stay forever, too? With an engrossing plot that keeps readers guessing and an enigmatic romantic lead, Young's latest is sure to please her fan base. Audrey's struggle to reconcile her life in the wake of losing her mother is palpable and adds weight to the story. Haunting and hard to put down.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)