Three wishes. One prom queen celebrating at the Jersey Shore. And one monster who will keep killing until her wishes are paid for.

Seven years ago, Sundae Valentine made a deal with a monster she met at the bottom of a motel pool. She didn’t know the wishes he offered had a price—or that the third wish, the one she still hasn’t made, will cost her life.

Back then, she barely escaped Wildwood alive. Now, the cheerleaders and football players are headed to the Jersey Shore for prom weekend—leaving Sundae no choice but to return to the scene of her sun-bleached nightmares.

Sundae tries to forget, throwing herself into the rides on the pier, the tequila-fueled dance parties, and the guitar-strumming girl she can’t quite look away from. She hopes the beast has forgotten, too.

But there are eyes like silver coins watching from the shadows, and teeth like a rusty saw glinting in the light of the boardwalk. Because Sundae still owes a debt. And whatever it takes, whoever he has to kill, this time the monster’s determined to collect.

Story Locale: Wildwood, New Jersey boardwalk and beach

The post Body Count first appeared on Shelves Bookstore.

In this new mystery from CL Montblanc, the author of Pride or Die, two internet enemies are forced to work together after a true crime meetup turns into a deadly case of its own.

Seventeen-year-old Sam Tombs hopes to get more eyes on the videos they make to raise awareness of crimes against LGBTQ+ teens. A true crime content creator event seems like the perfect opportunity to grow their channel—until the group becomes stranded at an eerie Victorian mansion, and one of them is killed in the night.

Sam’s alibi, and the only person they can trust, happens to be their mean, dorky internet nemesis Dylan. But the two must now put aside their rivalry and use their investigative skills to figure out who among the remaining teens is the killer, before their own deaths become tomorrow’s trending content.

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An ambitious teen enrolls at an elite science institute in Morbid Curiosities, a young adult thriller novel from author S. Hati.

When the Institute’s invitation arrived at my doorstep, it felt like it had been inked in my blood, sweat, and tears.

Aarya’s life plan has been set for as long as she can remember: finish high school with a bang, attend the best college she can get into, then land a prestigious biology research job. Her ticket to this dream is a one-year program at the Elizabethan Institute, the preeminent organization for life sciences in the United States, currently on the cusp of revealing a major project that could transform the worlds of biology and medicine.

But as Aarya tries to settle in to a school with sky-high academic expectations and research cloaked in mystery, it becomes clear that someone doesn’t want her there. As the scholarship student surrounded by rich, cutthroat peers who seem all too willing to torment her, she never expected to make friends, but the notes warning her to run rattle her to her core. She finds an ally in Sofia, a mysterious girl who claims to be the subject of closed-door experiments at the Institute and begs for Aarya’s help in figuring out what the Institute is really working on.

As rumors of mutated flora and fauna in the nearby city circulate and a murder investigation rocks the Institute, Aarya will have to navigate Sofia’s growing paranoia and her own increasingly unreliable memory to determine which classmates she can trust—and which would rather see her dead.

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Short, sharp, and expertly crafted, this realistic YA is a portrait of a girl who will do whatever it takes to carve out a place for herself in the world.

Destiny cannot count on anyone but herself. Her mother has struggled with addiction for all of Destiny’s seventeen years, moving them from town to town, bad boyfriend to bad boyfriend—including a particularly dark period in Texas, where Destiny ended up in a psychiatric hospital. But now they’re in a small town in a new state and her mother’s new boyfriend is sober and stable. And even more remarkable, Destiny has caught the eye of local golden boy Ryan.

But Destiny’s fairy tale bubble bursts when Ryan says their summer romance has to give way to football season. Destiny spirals hard, retreating into the same delusional and dissociative patterns that landed her in psychiatric care as a child, but this time the breakdown culminates in a pregnancy that can’t possibly be real.

Destiny’s skill as an artist is alternately a lifeline and a millstone as she struggles to resurface and reconnect with reality.

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A contemporary YA with a speculative twist about a college-bound girl who is struck by lightning and a storm cloud attuned to her emotions begins to follow her everywhere.

“I was struck by lightning and now there’s rain following me around. I was struck by lightning and now there’s rain following me around.”

Megh is a Desi girl whose plans to escape to college on the West Coast are complicated when she gets struck by lightning in the first week of a prestigious summer internship. What results is a storm cloud that follows her everywhere, which seems to react in direct response to her emotions. Megh’s struggles with depression, fear of leaving her home and loved ones, and uncertainty about her future cause the cloud to act up, and in order not to disrupt her future she’s determined to find a way to control her feelings–with the help of a fellow intern with kind eyes and warm smile.

With its sweet friends-to-lovers romance, beautiful female friendships, and an original and sensitive take on what it’s like to struggle with strong negative emotions, RIGHT AS RAIN has the emotional complexity and fantastical elements of THE ASTONISHING COLOR OF AFTER and the modern attitude of EMERGENCY CONTACT. It’s the perfect laugh/cry read to accompany a hot, humid New York summer: charming and poignant and an all-around winsome teen read that speaks to living with depression honestly and movingly.

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A struggling teen discovers solace in technology that lets him view the erased memories of others. As he delves into the past of another boy harboring a dark secret, he embarks on a thrilling journey that uncovers a love he was forced to forget.

Seventeen-year-old Eli was in a near-fatal car crash. As the anniversary looms, his therapist and his family struggle to help him deal with the fallout. The accident has left him emotionally numb, with no memory of the months following the crash.

Desperate to feel something again, Eli discovers a black market for people’s memories. Erased memories that others can watch via a virtual reality simulation.

When he enters the story of a boy called Jack, he discovers a dark truth…a mind-blowing secret that sets him on a dangerous journey that could lead his heart back to where it belongs, or shatter his life forever.

Story Locale: Near-future dystopian England

The post Erase Me first appeared on Shelves Bookstore.

The Good Place meets the Brandy version of Cinderella in Until the Clock Strikes Midnight, a cozy, romantic fantasy from award-winning author Alechia Dow.

In this cozy YA fantasy, a Guardian and a Misfortune go head-to-head over the fate of a lovesick bookshop owner.

Darling is the most talented—and unusual—Guardian to get a chance at winning the coveted once-in-a-generation Mortal Outcome Council mentorship. Getting the spot would mean having the opportunity to shape the future happiness of all mortal realms—if she succeeds at her first assignment, Lucy Addlesberg. Darling thinks it’ll be an easy razzle-dazzle job… until she actually meets Lucy. Her life is a complete mess, from her failing bookshop in her downtrodden village to her doomed flirtation with the princess of Lumina. But if there’s one thing Darling’s good at, it’s a makeover.

Calamity is the most talented—and arrogant—Misfortune of his class. It’s his job to save mortals from their own terrible decisions made in the pursuit of the mythical “Happily Ever After.” When Calam is granted a shot at the Mortal Outcome Council mentorship, he thinks his dreams are finally coming true. But first, he must pass the test. It should be easy—Lucy Addlesberg has been unfortunate for years. All he has to do is continue her string of bad luck so she can finally come to terms with reality and settle for a safer, more logical path in life. Yet when he arrives, he finds that Lucy has a Guardian assigned to her too—a chipper overachiever who is as colorful as the magic pouring from her glittery wand.

To thwart each other, Darling and Calam insert themselves into Lucy’s life posing as a betrothed couple. As they try to guide her down what they each see as the best path for her, they start questioning their roles and ultimately what they truly want for themselves… and if those feelings of loathing they have for each other might actually be something more like love.

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When Blair accidentally becomes college roommates with her brother’s best friend, sparks fly in this hilarious rom-com from bestselling author Samantha Markum, perfect for fans of Lynn Painter and Emma Lord.

Blair might be a little type-A, but she never thought of herself as completely overbearing…that is, until her two best friends drop her from their housing arrangement a week before her pre-college summer coding program is about to start.

Blair knows if she switches to an on-campus dorm, her parents will make her give up her expensive sculpture class with her dream mentor in order to pay for it. Desperate, she agrees to be the fifth roommate to four off-campus sophomores who are also in a last-minute bind. But things get complicated when one of her new roommates turns out to be her brother’s best friend, Jamie Atwater.

Blair begs Jamie not to tell her brother about the new living arrangement. Her brother would go straight to their parents, who would definitely not approve, and all her plans would fall apart. So they strike a deal: she’ll help him finish coding the app he’s building if he promises to keep her secret.

Spending more time together shouldn’t be a problem. Sure, Jamie has a new haircut, a mysterious tattoo, and a year’s worth of earned muscle, but it’s not like Blair is noticing. After all, they’re only roommates, right?

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Three teens infiltrate the magical Ivy League in this heart-stopping dark academia romantasy, the first in a young adult duology from #1 New York Times bestselling author Melissa de la Cruz.

Raven, Atticus, and Dorian have dreamed of attending Sibylline for as long as they can remember. But when the magical Ivy League rejects them, the friends’ plans of a future together studying the arcane begin crashing down.

Until they decide to steal an education.

Getting jobs on campus, they sneak into lectures and swipe forbidden texts, dodging the administration’s watchful eye. In the quiet of night, in the thrill of secrecy, their magic awakens. And so do long-buried attractions that turn their friendship into something more.

But like magic, love can create, and it can destroy. As unrequited feelings and resentment threaten to fracture their bond, the trio discovers an insidious magic that has sunk its claws into Sibylline, killing students and corroding the very bones of the university. Now the three intruders may be the key to saving the institution from wreckage . . . if they don’t wreck one another first.

Story Locale: Sibylline (the magical ivy league university, located in Vermont)

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