An intoxicating, haunting new novel fromNew York Timesbestselling author Melissa Albert, in which the estranged adult children of a legendary author, written into their dead mothers beloved fantasy series, contend with the vine-like creep of legacy, memory, and magic

Guinevere Sharpe has two childhoods.

In one, she and her brother, Ennis, live in the wooded shadow of their family’s isolated Vermont farmhouse; in the other,the pages of their mothers world-famousNinth Citybooks, where their magical adventures have made them household names. In reality, Guinevere’s childhood isn’t the enchanted idyll her mothers readers imagine: she and Ennis are growing up near-feral, unwashed and underfed, escaping each day to the wild woods theyve made their playland. As Edith Sharpes books explode into epic popularity, the threats of a rural childhood give way to theescalatingperils of fameuntil the night it all goes up in flames,leaving Ediths series unfinished and her children the sole survivors.

Now an adult coasting on her mother’s name, Guinevere is mid-promotion for a ghostwritten memoir when her estranged brother, an artist who has until now spurned his family’s legacy, announces an upcoming installation titled Mother. As rumors swirl around a death connected to his last show, unsettling recollections from Guineveres childhood begin to surface. Her public facade starts to crack, forcing her to confront the questions she’s spent the last twenty years running from: What really happened the night of the fire? And what dark history lies behind their mothers fantasy world?

Wise to the mythic weight childhood memories gather over time, The Childrenwhispers to you from the hallway outside your bedroom, lights flickering as you turn the pages of a book that didn’t seem so scary a moment ago. It’s a story for anyone who’s ever revisited an old favorite and found it cast in a darker light, the line separating magic and memory blurring as the gap widens between the authors we imagine and the people they turn out to be.