Seraphina by Rachel Hartman
If you want more characters with secrets to hide...or discover...
Monstrous Beauty by Elizabeth Fama
Fierce mermaid Syrenka falls in love with Ezra, a young naturalist in 1872. When she abandons her life underwater for a chance at happiness, she is unaware that this decision comes with deadly consequences. One hundred forty years later, seventeen-year-old Hester meets a mysterious stranger and feels overwhelmingly, inexplicably drawn to him. For generations, love has resulted in death for the women in her family, so Hester investigates her family’s strange, sad history. The answers she seeks are waiting in the graveyard, the crypt, and at the bottom of the ocean, but powerful forces will do anything to keep her from uncovering her connection to Syrenka and the tragedies from so long ago.
The blend of history and fantasy enhance both storylines as the narrative shifts between past and present, gradually doling out clues. - Kirkus
Fierce mermaid Syrenka falls in love with Ezra, a young naturalist in 1872. When she abandons her life underwater for a chance at happiness, she is unaware that this decision comes with deadly consequences. One hundred forty years later, seventeen-year-old Hester meets a mysterious stranger and feels overwhelmingly, inexplicably drawn to him. For generations, love has resulted in death for the women in her family, so Hester investigates her family’s strange, sad history. The answers she seeks are waiting in the graveyard, the crypt, and at the bottom of the ocean, but powerful forces will do anything to keep her from uncovering her connection to Syrenka and the tragedies from so long ago.
The blend of history and fantasy enhance both storylines as the narrative shifts between past and present, gradually doling out clues. - Kirkus
Dust Girl by Sarah Zettel
Mixed-race Callie LeRoux has always passed for white in her Depression-era Kansas town. But after her mother disappears in a huge dust storm, Callie meets a stranger who reveals that Callie's father (whom she has never met) is not only a black man, but a fairy - and that Callie may be instrumental in a burgeoning war in the courts of the fae. Callie faces magical dangers at every turn in this story packed with atmospheric period details, intriguing characters, action, and suspense.
With a historical note and a Woody Guthrie soundtrack, this novel does a fine job of blending a splendidly grounded Dust Bowl setting with a paranormal adventure. -Kirkus
Mixed-race Callie LeRoux has always passed for white in her Depression-era Kansas town. But after her mother disappears in a huge dust storm, Callie meets a stranger who reveals that Callie's father (whom she has never met) is not only a black man, but a fairy - and that Callie may be instrumental in a burgeoning war in the courts of the fae. Callie faces magical dangers at every turn in this story packed with atmospheric period details, intriguing characters, action, and suspense.
With a historical note and a Woody Guthrie soundtrack, this novel does a fine job of blending a splendidly grounded Dust Bowl setting with a paranormal adventure. -Kirkus