Description

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Edward Scissorhands meets When the Moon Was Ours in this “darkly whimsical…engrossing” (Kirkus Reviews) novel about two teen sisters who fight to protect the mysterious stranger who literally fell from the stars and into their backyard.

Strange things have always happened in the small town of Darling…

​​​Yet Delta Wilding and her sister Bee are familiar with the peculiar. Raised by an eccentric father always on the hunt for the spectacular, they’re used to following weather patterns that twirl onto strange paths, a car that refuses to play any artist but one, and living in a sentient house with whims of its own. But when a mysterious boy falls from the stars into the woods behind the Wilding sisters’ farmhouse, nothing can prepare them for the extraordinary turn their lives are about to take.

Extraordinary, and dangerous.

Starling Rust is not from this world and his presence in the Wilding home brings attention. As the terrified locals, Delta’s ex-boyfriend, and the unscrupulous mayor descend onto their home, both Delta and her sister go to incredible lengths to protect their mystical visitor—especially as Delta’s growing feelings for Starling could prove the greatest risk of all.

About the Author

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Isabel Strychacz is from a small town in the San Francisco Bay Area. An alumna of Mills College with degrees in English and history, she is getting her MFA degree in creative writing from Manchester Metropolitan University. She currently lives in England with her husband and daughter where she works as a copywriter for a PR and communications agency. She’s the author of the novel Starling and House of Thorns. You can find her online @IsabelStrychaczAuthor (Instagram, TikTok, and Threads), @IsabelStrychacz (X, previously known as Twitter), and at IsabelStrychacz.com. 

Praise For…

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"Evoking a darkly whimsical tone and told mainly from Delta’s third-person perspective with chapters interspersed from Bee’s and Starling’s points of view, this tale is an engrossing, languidly paced work of suspense exploring family and small-town dynamics and loyalties. . . .An earnest, slowly unfolding drama." -- Kirkus

"Debut author Strychacz dusts her novel with the supernatural as she puts humanity’s beauty and
ugliness on equal display, keeping this heartfelt story from slipping into sentimentality and
sparkling all the more for it." -- Booklist