Kiersten White is known for write theCamelot Rising , And I Darken , and Paranormalcy YA serial publication , but next class she ’ll be bring out her first adult novel . revulsion tale Hide is abouta high - stakes competitionthat takes place at anabandoned amusement park . If that creepy scene is n’t enough to draw you in , io9 has an single prowler peek for you today .
First , here ’s a description . Again , we must accentuate : abandoned entertainment parking lot .
The challenge : spend a week obscure in an abandoned amusement park and do n’t get caught .
A glimpse of the menacing cover of Hide. See the full image below!Image: Del Rey
The prize : enough money to shift everything .
Even though everyone is heroic to win — to seize their dream futures or escape their persistent past — Mack feels sure that she can beat her rival . All she has to do is hide , and she ’s an expert at that .
It ’s the reason she ’s alive , and her class is n’t .
Image: Del Rey
But as the mass around her begin disappearing one by one , Mack realizes this rival is more menacing than even she reckon , and that together might be the only way to hold up .
Here ’s a aspect at the full cover , project by Scott Biel — adopt by the excerpt , in which we meet Mack along with some of her competitors .
Fourteen competitors . Seven Clarence Shepard Day Jr. . The lean is set . agreement have been made for rescue inside the park — solid food , gun for the generator , blankets and cots and whatever else is needed . Supplies have been assemble for outside the common . Cell phone jammers . Movies and books for the interminable wait . superpower washing machine for the inevitable ending .
The list is circulate , along with photos . Everyone is supposed to memorize it . Few do . They challenger are tacked onto the wall at Ray ’s diner one by one . Betting on the outcome is strictly against the rule , but it does n’t stop them from ranking , making predictions , picking a deary . The competitors can be divided into two groups .
Those who are best described as aspiring :
A social media fitness simulation
A graffiti artist
A YouTube prank show horde
An app developer - gash - house sitter
A jewelry graphic designer - slash - blackguard Zimmer frame
A avid crossfit instructor
An actress with life-threatening solid food allergy
Those who are comfortably describe as drag one’s heels :
A writer with wicked the great unwashed allergies
A son equal parts banish and turn a loss
The kindest gas station attendant in Pocatello , Idaho
A vet
A solar panel salesman
An perpetual intern
And Mack , who is nobody , if she has her way
Seventeen hours on a jitney to another bus to a third bus to a glorified minivan , and finally Mack is delivered to the middle of the midsection of nowhere . She often wonders which is more anon. : a big metropolis with so many people to detect that no one notices anyone , or the empty countryside where no one live . Stepping off the van into a swirl of dust , recognize by no one , she suspects the former . She can see for what experience like naut mi in either direction down the road . Which means she can be seen , as well .
If she does n’t get ahead , will they give her a bus ticket back ? Or will she be stuck here ? She does n’t even know where here is , shy what state she ’s in . It ’s green , wildly so , with huge trees and monotone dirt ball . It seems flavorless , but she ca n’t see beyond the road or the trees .
She sits on the side of the road , clutching the Ox Extreme Sports duffel traveling bag she was have . It contain seven shirt and four pairs of pants , all a weary shade of black . New but already faded , somehow . They find conversant .
There ’s also a toilet articles kit , which feel like a cutter mercy . There were several granola Browning automatic rifle and a feeding bottle of body of water , but those disappeared a few minute into the 17 she expend get here . Hungry is thirsty . No point in time in stretch out what she has when she can have the luxury of a full venter once .
After an 60 minutes , her uneasiness sharpen , pulling ever pissed . No one has come in . The tree bulk large at her back . The route stretches , empty .
Has the plot already begin ? Has she already lost ?
It could be tough . She ’s dateless mile from where she be intimate , but she has wearing apparel . Toothpaste , a toothbrush , deodourant , a combing . A stalwart bag . She ’s technically in the lead of where she was before .
The protest of a much - abused machine suspension greets her long before another van force up . She ’s release . Either it ’s here to pick her up — found!—or to fork out her to the literal plot .
It spews out three the great unwashed and then unceremoniously keep along the unnumberable route . Two women and a man . A boy , really , Mack gets the sense . He ca n’t be much jr. than she is , and he ’s far taller , but something — the boyish part of his pilus , the orotund face , the long - sleeved white clitoris - up hold out tucked into ill - meet , cheap navy slack — suggests he was clothe by someone else .
One of the women is put together with an artist ’s attention to point . She is as much make-up and hair product as she is person , and Mack ’s dazzled by the ocular perfection . It ’s almost hard to look at her . The other woman wear a black tank top over baggy shipment gasp . She limps slightly as she agitate off the route and next to Mack .
The limping cleaning lady , her bombilate head emphasizing her large dark eyes , regard Mack without shame . The beautiful woman does n’t regard Mack at all . She scowls at her phone , hold it ever high as though reception can be found that way . And the boy looks everywhere but at the women he is with . A fine sheen of sweat is on his forehead , blotto spots at his armpits . He look ready to fly .
Someone here is more terrified than Mack . It ’s soothe .
“ Fucking stamp out me , there ’s really no reception , ” the beautiful woman finally tell , still clutching her phone as some sort of amulet . “ light is too coarse , anyway . ” For the first sentence , she attend at Mack , who has scooted farther back from the road , almost to the tree diagram line . “ Did they order you anything ? ”
Mack shakes her head . When the van pick her up at the bus station , the machine driver had only said , “ Oxen Free ? ” He even require her what it was , but she mumble an resolution and pretend to shine asleep .
“ Ava , ” the char with the bombinate head say .
“ What ? ” the beautiful charwoman flick .
“ Ava . ”
The beautiful charwoman throws both hands in the breeze . “ What ? ”
The buzzed woman lifts an supercilium , longanimity wearing thin . “ We did n’t talk in the avant-garde , so I ’m enter myself . I ’m Ava . And you are … ”
Finally , the beautiful charwoman relaxes , snort a laugh . “ God , distressing , I ’m such a bitch when I ’m hungry . I ’m Ava , too . That ’s why I was confused . ”
“ May the best Ava winnings , Ava Two . ” Buzzed Ava ’s wry smile shows dimples deep enough to get fall behind in .
“ I mean to . ” Beautiful Ava ’s tonicity is more playful than vicious . She retreat into the trees , snapping several selfies . Buzzed Ava turns to Mack expectantly .
“ Mack . ” Mack offers her name as a complete sentence , hoping it will be accepted as such .
Buzzed Ava sits on the ground , stretch one peg easily in front of herself and manually positioning the other . “ Good to match you , Mack . I trust I beat you , and it ’s not personal . ”
Mack does n’t answer . It ’s a contention . Of naturally they want to gain .
Buzzed Ava nod toward the boy , who has crossed the route and is stand on the other side , staring resolutely away from them . His shoulders are change state inward , his posture less expectancy than defeat . Already .
“ That ’s LeGrand . He got picked up the same prison term as me , before Ava Two . When I took off my jacket , he twitched so heavily bet away , I think he ’d break his neck . Poor Thomas Kid is terrify of woman . Might give him an bound . He ’ll be so desperate to avoid seeing us , he ’ll never fall out . ”
“ I think he ’s gay . ” Beautiful Ava sits on the ground next to buzz Ava . Beautiful Ava is slender and bony . Buzzed Ava is loggerheaded , strong looking . Mack admires and envy the job of her shoulders , the heft of her core . Her looks challenge in a different manner than beautiful Ava ’s , but both depict attention .
Mack ’s own whisker is cut myopic enough that she could be a cat , or she could be a daughter . She wears oversized shirts and baggy pant , hired hand shoved in pockets to throw her shoulder joint forward and veil her chest . Ava and Ava hide nothing .
Mack think she ’ll beat both of them .
“ Not gay , ” buzzed Ava says , rive up a prospicient strand of gage and holding it to her mouth . She mishandle on it , but no sound come out . “ If he ’s that scared of distaff pelt , he ’s got ta be interested . ” She leans back , squint toward Mack . “ What ’s your story ? ” There ’s something equal parts playful and appraising in the way a single bold brow raise .
None of these people are Mack ’s friends . No one is her ally . No one will be . She can play skillful and trust a mumble reply satisfies buzz Ava , but she does n’t think it will . So she run for the other tactics .
“ know off , ” Mack answer .
Beautiful Ava scowls , offended by procurator . Buzzed Ava ’s look shift , but not in a threatened or tempestuous way . “ Cool . ” She turn back to the route .
Mack retreats further into the shade , but in spite of her pink slip , both Avas eventually join her there . The Sunday is inexorable and monotone , like the insects around them . After an hour or two , another van bumps along to them . Beautiful Ava runs up to greet it , but it ’s the same story . Hired and dropping off . Over the course of instruction of the day , three more vans total until finally there are fourteen people waiting . They all seem around the same eld , mid - twenty dollar bill , give or take a few years .
Mack feel more at easiness now . With so many people there — several of whom are do-or-die to establish authorisation and be noticed , talking and laughing forte — she barely register . Except to hum Ava , who brazenly stares at her and winks whenever caught .
When the last van pulls off , everyone looks down the road , waiting .
Five hours later and the climate has shifted considerably . Everyone is sweaty . There ’s nowhere to sit but the ground . No phones work . No one has any nutrient or piss — though one expertly muscle man increases monetary offers for solid food by the time of day . One of the cleaning woman , a brunette who seem like a toothpaste commercial with her dazzlingly white grin , battle cry . Several vow to leave behind scathing review of the experience online . A couple of the men suggest walk down the route to regain the nearest town , but fear of pretermit the competition keeps them in space . Everyone is short - tempered and angry . Except LeGrand , who stays at a distance , looking perfectly fall behind , seethe Ava , who is take a nap with her arms for a pillow , and Mack , who know she ’s two full day from being too hungry to function . A shade of a grinning haunts her face .
She can acquire this .
From the book blot out by Kiersten White . right of first publication © 2022 by Kiersten White . reprint by agreement with Del Rey Books , an imprint of Random House , a division of Penguin Random House LLC . All rights set aside .
blot out by Kiersten White will be released May 24 , 2022 ; you may pre - enjoin a copyhere .
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