The Mary Shelley Club

Rachel Chavez is the new girl at Manhattan Prep, and she does not much like her classmates, who strike her as bored and rich. She spends her free time with horror movies instead, where stabby serial killers and homicidal dolls are easier company. The films also help her avoid certain memories she would rather keep buried.

Then the Mary Shelley Club recruits her. It is a secret society of students who stage Fear Tests, elaborate pranks built on urban legends and movie tropes. Rachel takes to it at first, enjoying the power that comes with scaring people on purpose.

The pranks grow bigger and more dangerous, and the competition among members turns deadly. Rachel is now in a game she cannot afford to lose, and getting out may not be an option.

This is a young adult thriller with a horror-movie streak, twisty in its plotting and playful about the genre's rules: stay together, avoid abandoned buildings, never make out while a killer is loose.

Real life, as Rachel learns, does not come with such clear instructions. The tone mixes dark humor with suspense, and the setting is a Manhattan prep school where the social stakes are as sharp as the physical ones.