Harvest House

High school sophomore Hughie Wolfe, a citizen of the Muscogee Nation, feels adrift after his school's fall theater production, in which he expected to get the lead role, is canceled due to budget cuts. In lieu of pursuing the stage, he volunteers as an actor at a haunted house fundraiser located at a rural crossroads that is rumored to be beset by the ghost of an "Indian maiden." What Hughie thought would be a lighthearted Halloween attraction instead feels like a cruel joke when he's cast as an "Indian ghost" and learns that the organizer intends to use insensitive characterizations of Indigenous persons to populate a "haunted Indian burial ground" setting ("They're dancing around, making goofy war whoops, chasing people," Hughie reports). Alternating chapters, meanwhile, feature eerie first-person narration by Celeste, the Native woman haunting the crossroads. When a video purportedly depicting Celeste's attempts to protect brown girls from a mysterious "bad man" goes viral, Hughie's Kansas town plunges into chaos. Using short, propulsive chapters, Smith (Hearts Unbroken), a member of the Muscogee Nation, intertwines thoughtful conversation surrounding the racism faced by Indigenous teenagers with a convincing ghost story to craft a spine-tingling, edge-of-the-seat chiller. An author's note and glossary conclude. Ages 12-up. Agent: Ginger Knowlton, Curtis Brown. (Apr.)

[Smith] draws on effective examples of microaggressions, bigotry, and exploitation to punctuate her point. But she also includes moments of joy: Hughie speaking to his sister in Mvskoke, the language of his ancestors, and doing seasonal activities with his friends. What results is an atmospheric, transfixing mystery.
—Shelf Awareness (starred review) 

Superbly highlights and discusses key topics facing contemporary Indigenous youths, including redface and the plights of missing and murdered Indigenous women and two-spirit people. Hughie's encounters with different types of racism are recognizably authentic, handled with delicacy and distinct realism. . . . An atmospheric novel compellingly interweaving chills and contemporary themes.
—Kirkus Reviews 

Smith's genre-bending companion novel to the beloved Hearts Unbroken is a deliciously spooky adventure teen audiences will devour.
—Buzzfeed

The spirit of a young indigenous woman is rumored to haunt a crossroads, and who she was and what happened to her - and how the raw injustice of the past can leach its poison into the present - are at the heart of this well-crafted mystery from Cynthia Leitich Smith, a citizen of the Muscogee Nation and the author-curator of Heartdrum, a Native-focused imprint at HarperCollins Children's Books.
—The Buffalo News

Leitich Smith returns to the world of her award-winning young adult novel, "Hearts Unbroken," with "Harvest House," which centers on Hughie, the younger brother of Lou Wolfe from "Hearts." Hughie's grappling with mysterious goings-on near a Halloween haunted house that plans to use Native stereotypes as the basis for one of its attractions. The Muscogee (Creek) Nation teen's struggle with why and how to speak up, along with the very real dangers the book explores, make "Harvest House" equal parts thoughtful and thrilling.
—The Austin-American Statesman