cover image Legacy of Lies

Legacy of Lies

Elizabeth Chandler. Simon Pulse, $6.99 (192pp) ISBN 978-0-7434-0028-2

Launching the author's Dark Secrets series, this perkily paced if predictable tale centers on 16-year-old Megan, summoned to visit her grandmother in the sprawling Maryland house the family has owned for generations. Years before, the woman had disowned her daughter, Megan's adoptive mother, and this visit will be Megan's first meeting with her. Megan is shocked when she first drives up to the family home--she recognizes it from recurring dreams. Within, Grandmother is ill-tempered and unwelcoming, as is Matt, Megan's cousin, who has lived with Grandmother since his parents' difficult divorce. Chandler (At First Sight) lays on the plot's supernatural elements with a heavy hand: Megan hears that her grandmother's house is haunted, learns that she is the exact age at which Grandmother's sister and rival, Avril, mysteriously died and--one night after hearing a voice introducing itself as Avril--sees an apparition of a girl in a mirror and then a vision of herself (or is it Avril?) lying in her bed, dead. The resolution of the plot, which involves reincarnation, may be sufficiently far-flung to put off some readers, but most are likely to find Chandler's easygoing yet tight writing style worth the journey out there. Ages 11-14. (Oct.) FYI: Elizabeth Chandler is the pen name of picture book author M.C. Helldorfer.