House of Hollow

'Stepping nimbly among the liminal spaces and eerie real-world haunts of our heroine’s cipher-sister, this haunting modern fairytale will wrap you up like a glittering fog, before going for your throat.’ Melissa Albert, author of The Hazel Wood

Iris Hollow and her two older sisters are unquestionably strange. Ever since they disappeared on a suburban street in Scotland as children only to return a month a later with no memory of what happened to them, odd, eerie occurrences seem to follow in their wake. And they’re changing. First, their dark hair turned white. Then, their blue eyes slowly turned black. People find them disturbingly intoxicating, unbearably beautiful and inexplicably dangerous.
Now, ten years later, seventeen-year-old Iris Hollow is doing all she can to fit in and graduate high school – something her two famously glamorous globe-trotting older sisters, Grey and Vivi, never managed to do. But when Grey goes missing, leaving behind only bizarre clues, Iris and Vivi are left to trace her last few days. They aren’t the only ones looking for her. As they brush against the supernatural, they realise that the story they’ve been told about their past is unravelling and the world that returned them seemingly unharmed ten years ago, might just be calling them home.

Krystal Sutherland’s latest novel is a dark and twisty modern-day fairytale that expertly melds the fantastical with the real as the Hollow sisters discover just how much horror can lie beneath the surface.

A 2022-2023 Florida Teens Read Pick
A 2022 Bank Street Best Children’s Book of the Year
A 2022 International Thriller Writer Award Finalist
A 2022 Texas Tayshas Reading List Pick
A 2021 New York Public Library Best Book Pick

“This is slow-burn horror with imagery steeped in the senses . . . and Sutherland maximizes tension by playing into familiar tropes and then tearing away from them . . . The ending manages to be both horrific and heartbreaking . . . [with a] lingering chill.” —The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books, starred review

“Wonderfully creepy and full of unnerving supernatural flourishes.” —PopSugar

“[Readers] will be eviscerated. . . Alive with lush language and a dark fairy tale feel, this is a compelling readalike for lovers of Holly Black’s many wonderful fair folk standalones and series.” —School Library Journal

“Smart and assured narration easily carries a fast-paced story entwining themes of grief and loss with elements of folklore and some very inventive body horror. The pervasive feeling of dread builds to a shocking twist. A lush and darkly twisted modern fairy tale.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Filled with evocative detail, Sutherland’s dark fantasy teems with eerie atmosphere . . . [in] Sutherland’s carefully crafted fantasy world. Readers who are delighted by stories of the uncanny . . . will find themselves enchanted.” —Publishers Weekly

“In House of Hollow, Krystal Sutherland turns her razor-sharp imagination to new horizons and proves, once again, that words blossom at her command. This story will steal up your spine, slip beneath your skin, and stick to you like honey.” —Samantha Shannon, New York Times bestselling author of the Bone Season series and The Priory of the Orange Tree

“Filled with lush language and a fairy tale feel, this horror story takes readers on a rollercoaster ride of emotions. . . Hand this to your readers who love Holly Black books and dark twisted fairytales. This high speed ride will catapult readers to an end many may see coming, but which is nevertheless shocking when it finally arrives.” —School Library Connection

“Dark and delicious, House of Hollow hums with malice and mystery. I devoured it whole.” —Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies

“An intoxicating, gorgeously grotesque fever dream full of the impossible stench of carrion flowers, the allure of haunted stairways in the woods and doors leading nowhere. A beautifully crafted, addictively dark fairy tale with horns!” —Dawn Kurtagich, author of The Dead House