Stranger Danger

March 20, 2023
A week studying for finals in a remote farmhouse turns terrifying for a group of high school seniors in this briskly paced mystery by Stoffels (Room Service). Renting a secluded house, Nova; her boyfriend, Vin; and their best friend Lotus go off the grid to focus on academics, forgoing smartphones, Wi-Fi, and other technology. Following unexplained happenings that include missing items and sudden injury, the teens soon realize that someone has been watching them. Armed with only an unreliable cell phone and the house’s dangerous landline, which delivers an electric shock when the trio try to use it, the group struggles to call for help as their adversary closes in. All three teens have secrets they’ve been keeping from one another, which sow distrust as they’re revealed. Via alternating perspectives that feature Lotus’s savvy first-person narration and an unknown party whose identity is gradually unraveled over the course of the story, Stoffels presents a bemusing mystery punctuated by deceptive twists and sometimes confusing, if effectively shocking, reveals. A plotline involving a student-teacher relationship, and its potential consequences, is minimally explored. All characters are assumed white. Ages 12–up.