PARADISE COAST

An attempt to solve a 40-year-old Florida mystery turns into a high-stakes thriller when a recent murder comes to light.

Decades ago, a young socialite ended up dead, a local teen went on the run, and animosities flared between Cape Hope’s locals—labeled Chasers—and the rich and powerful resort community called the Collective. For years, the Everglades have hidden the secrets of the crumbling Starline Hotel on Rum Runner Island, but a powerful storm churns up the past. In alternating first-person chapters, Noa Acosta and Jamie Matthews—along with their friends, Tech Mendez and Shawn Callen—search for evidence to unravel the mystery that’s shaped the town, stop the hostility that’s brewing between its communities, clear a family’s name, and offer a chance at redemption. Young creates an ominous tone, immersing readers in a visceral and vivid setting—a lush landscape, where a dead body is clasped in a “marsh’s wet embrace” and a “thick, sludgy kind of quiet” permeates the air. The stakes are high—with threats both from the unforgiving nature of the landscape and from those who want to keep the truth buried. Elements of the past and current murders are expertly woven together with carefully laid backstory. Jamie and Shawn read white, and Noa and Tech are cued Latine.

Atmospheric and suspenseful; readers will be engrossed until the last page.