Book Beginnings, First Line Friday, & Friday 56: The Lost Boys of Barlowe Theater by Jaime Jo Wright

Book Beginnings is a weekly meme hosted by Rose City Reader that asks you to share the first sentence (or so) of the book you're reading. Friday 56 is hosted by Freda's Voice and asks you to grab a book (any book), turn to page 56 or 56% in your ereader and share a non-spoilery sentence or two. I'm also linking up with Carrie at Reading is My Superpower for First Line Friday. (Friday 56 is on hiatus right now, but I'll still be participating.)

This week I'm featuring The Lost Boys of Barlowe Theater by Jaime Jo Wright, which releases this Tuesday, October 10. I've read all of Wright's books, and this is one of my favorites. It's so good!

About the Book

It promises beauty but steals life instead. Will the ghosts of Barlowe Theater entomb them all?

Barlowe Theater stole the life of Greta Mercy's eldest brother during its construction. Now in 1915, the completed theater appears every bit as deadly. When Greta's younger brother goes missing after breaking into the building, Greta engages the assistance of a local police officer to help her unveil the already ghostly secrets of the theater. But when help comes from an unlikely source, Greta decides that to save her family she must uncover the evil that haunts the theater and put its threat to rest.

Decades later, Kit Boyd's best friend vanishes during a ghost walk at the Barlowe Theater, and old stories of mysterious disappearances and ghoulish happenings are revived. Then television ghost-hunting host and skeptic Evan Fisher joins Kit in the quest to identify the truth behind the theater's history. Kit reluctantly agrees to work with him in hopes of finding her missing friend. As the theater's curse unravels Kit's life, she is determined to put an end to the evil that has marked the theater and their hometown for the last century.

Book Beginnings / First Line Friday

October 1915

Kipper's Grove, Wisconsin

Sometimes death came quietly. A phantom swooping in and siphoning the last remnant of a soul from one's body, leaving behind a shell of a person who once was and would never be again. Other times, death decided that dramatics coupled with terror were its preferred method of delivery. Tonight, that was the chosen form death took.

Friday 56

"Who grabbed me?" Kit demanded. She wasn't prepared for this. She'd rather be at home with her ant farm, watching documentaries about dung beetles, her feet in socks with bumblebees on them, drinking an average cup of coffee. Just like she always had. Before this. Before Barlowe Theater and the first ghost walk. Before Madison disappeared.

What have you been reading lately?