Format: Hardcover, 352 pages
Release Date: January 8, 2019
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Source: Library
Genre: Young Adult / Thrillers & Suspense
Echo Ridge is small-town America. Ellery’s never been there, but she’s heard all about it. Her aunt went missing there at age seventeen. And only five years ago, a homecoming queen put the town on the map when she was killed. Now Ellery has to move there to live with a grandmother she barely knows.
The town is picture-perfect, but it’s hiding secrets. And before school even begins for Ellery, someone has declared open season on homecoming, promising to make it as dangerous as it was five years ago. Then, almost as if to prove it, another girl goes missing.
Ellery knows all about secrets. Her mother has them; her grandmother does too. And the longer she’s in Echo Ridge, the clearer it becomes that everyone there is hiding something. The thing is, secrets are dangerous—and most people aren’t good at keeping them. Which is why in Echo Ridge, it’s safest to keep your secrets to yourself.
Two Can Keep a Secret, by Karen M. McManus, is a
young adult thriller about a small town called Echo Ridge where Prom Queens
keep disappearing or are just outright murdered. 17-year old Ellery Corcoran
and her twin brother Ezra must leave their La Puente, California home and move
to Echo Ridge, a small town in Vermont, and live with their maternal
grandmother while their mother goes to rehab. They've never been to Echo Ridge
before, and barely know their grandmother, even though their mother grew up
here, and was even crowned homecoming queen.
Homecoming 1996, while Sadie is being crowned, her
twin sister Sarah disappears and has never been seen or heard from again. Sadie
left town when she was 18. She's only been back for her father's funeral.
Ellery and Ezra's arrival in Echo Ridge doesn't exactly go smoothy. First is
the discovery of a body in a hailstorm on the road. Apparently, a well-liked
local high school teacher was the victim of a hit and run. The twins quickly
find their new home is steeped in secrets, disappearing girls and murder.
5 years ago (October of 2014), Lacey Kilduff was
found dead in what used to be called Murderland now renamed Fright Farm. Like
Sarah, nobody has any clue as to what happened to Lacey, or who might have been
responsible. Both have remained unsolved, but its effects run deep within the
community. The horrors continue when Ellery is nominated as one of the
Homecoming Queen candidates. The vote is obviously fixed since she's only been
her for several weeks. She immediately finds stunning warnings about the return
of the alleged Echo Ridge killer.
Murder The Sequel, Coming Soon!Remember Murderland, Princess? I do.
This story alternates between Ellery and Malcolm
Kelly. Malcolm can't get away from the past. Not when his brother Declan was a
possible suspect in Lacey's murder that ended up breaking up his family. Not
when his best teacher at Echo Park HS is killed by a hit & run driver. Not
when Declan and Lacey's friends begin to trickle back to Echo Park right before
Homecoming. And, not when Brook Bennett goes missing and he's the last person
to allegedly see her alive. Why is Declan back in town? Did he have anything to
do with Lacey's death? Did he have anything to do with Brook's disappearance?
What's worse is that Malcolm, like Declan, is immediately a suspect and nearly
everyone outside of Emery, Ezra and his friend Mia Kwon turn on him.
McManus really did keep me guessing here, for a while
anyway until you started to piece together the clues. I'd say I wasn't all that
shocked with how things resolved themselves and who is the real mastermind was
behind all of this. There was another minor mystery for Ellery to solve since
she's here in Echo Ridge. Who was her father? Was it some one-night stand? Was
it one of Sadie's former High School conquests? One of the final revelations in
this book was a complete stunner because the author waited until the final
sentence to reveal a stunning secret. Wow. Didn't see that coming!
"Got a secret
Can you keep it?
Swear, this one you'll save
Better lock it in your pocket
Takin' this one to the grave
If I show you, then I know you
Won't tell what I said
'Cause two can keep a secret
If one of them is dead."
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Ellery
Friday, August 30
If I believed in omens, this would be a bad one.
There’s
only one suitcase left on the baggage carousel. It’s bright pink,
covered with Hello Kitty stickers, and definitely not mine.
My
brother, Ezra, watches it pass us for the fourth time, leaning on the
handle of his own oversized suitcase. The crowd around the carousel is
nearly gone, except for a couple arguing about who was supposed to keep
track of their rental car reservation. “Maybe you should take it,” Ezra
suggests. “Seems like whoever owns it wasn’t on our flight, and I bet
they have an interesting wardrobe. A lot of polka dots, probably. And
glitter.” His phone chimes, and he pulls it out of his pocket. “Nana’s
outside.”
“I
can’t believe this,” I mutter, kicking the toe of my sneaker against
the carousel’s metal side. “My entire life was in that suitcase.”
It’s
a slight exaggeration. My actual entire life was in La Puente,
California, until about eight hours ago. Other than a few boxes shipped
to Vermont last week, the suitcase contains what’s left.
“I
guess we should report it.” Ezra scans the baggage claim area, running a
hand over his close-cropped hair. He used to have thick dark curls like
mine, hanging in his eyes, and I still can’t get used to the cut he got
over the summer. He tilts his suitcase and pivots toward the
information desk. “Over here, probably.”
The
skinny guy behind the desk looks like he could still be in high school,
with a rash of red pimples dotting his cheeks and jawline. A gold name
tag pinned crookedly to his blue vest reads “Andy.” Andy’s thin lips
twist when I tell him about my suitcase, and he cranes his neck toward
the Hello Kitty bag still making carousel laps. “Flight 5624 from Los
Angeles? With a layover in Charlotte?” I nod. “You sure that’s not
yours?”
“Positive.”
“Bummer.
It’ll turn up, though. You just gotta fill this out.” He yanks open a
drawer and pulls out a form, sliding it toward me. “There’s a pen around
here somewhere,” he mutters, pawing half-heartedly through a stack of
papers.
“I
have one.” I unzip the front of my backpack, pulling out a book that I
place on the counter while I feel around for a pen. Ezra raises his
brows when he sees the battered hardcover.
“Really, Ellery?” he asks. “You brought In Cold Blood on the plane? Why didn’t you just ship it with the rest of your books?”
“It’s valuable,” I say defensively.
Ezra rolls his eyes. “You know that’s not Truman Capote’s actual signature. Sadie got fleeced.”
“Whatever.
It’s the thought that counts,” I mutter. Our mother bought me the
“signed” first edition off eBay after she landed a role as Dead Body #2
on Law & Order four years ago. She gave Ezra a Sex Pistols album
cover with a Sid Vicious autograph that was probably just as forged. We
should’ve gotten a car with reliable brakes instead, but Sadie’s never
been great at long-term planning. “Anyway, you know what they say. When
in Murderland . . .” I finally extract a pen and start scratching my
name across the form.
“You
headed for Echo Ridge, then?” Andy asks. I pause on the second c of my
last name and he adds, “They don’t call it that anymore, you know. And
you’re early. It doesn’t open for another week.”
“I
know. I didn’t mean the theme park. I meant the . . .” I trail off
before saying town and shove In Cold Blood into my bag. “Never mind,” I
say, returning my attention to the form. “How long does it usually take
to get your stuff back?”
“Shouldn’t be more than a day.” Andy’s eyes drift between Ezra and me. “You guys look a lot alike. You twins?”
I nod and keep writing. Ezra, ever polite, answers, “We are.”
“I
was supposed to be a twin,” Andy says. “The other one got absorbed in
the womb, though.” Ezra lets out a surprised little snort, and I bite
back a laugh. This happens to my brother all the time; people overshare
the strangest things with him. We might have almost the same face, but
his is the one everyone trusts. “I always thought it would’ve been cool
to have a twin. You could pretend to be one another and mess with
people.” I look up, and Andy is squinting at us again. “Well. I guess
you guys can’t do that. You aren’t the right kind of twins.”
“Definitely not,” Ezra says with a fixed smile.
I
write faster and hand the completed form to Andy, who tears off the top
sheets and gives me the yellow carbon. “So somebody will get in touch,
right?” I ask.
“Yep,” Andy says. “You don’t hear from them tomorrow, call the number at the bottom. Have fun in Echo Ridge.”
Ezra exhales loudly as we head for the revolving door, and I grin at him over my shoulder. “You make the nicest friends.”
He
shudders. “Now I can’t stop thinking about it. Absorbed. How does that
even happen? Did he . . . No. I’m not going to speculate. I don’t want
to know. What a weird thing to grow up with, though, huh? Knowing how
easily you could’ve been the wrong twin.”
We
push through the door into a blast of stifling, exhaust-filled air that
takes me by surprise. Even on the last day of August, I’d expected
Vermont to be a lot cooler than California. I pull my hair off my neck
while Ezra scrolls through his phone. “Nana says she’s circling because
she didn’t want to park in a lot,” he reports.
I raise my brows at him. “Nana’s texting and driving?”
“Apparently.”
I
haven’t seen my grandmother since she visited us in California ten
years ago, but from what I can remember, that seems out of character.
We
wait a few minutes, wilting in the heat, until a forest-green Subaru
station wagon pulls up beside us. The passenger-side window rolls down,
and Nana sticks her head out. She doesn’t look much different than she
does over Skype, although her thick gray bangs appear freshly cut. “Go
on, get in,” she calls, side-eyeing the traffic cop a few feet from us.
“They won’t let you idle for more than a minute.” She pulls her head
back in as Ezra wheels his solitary suitcase toward the trunk.
When
we slide into the backseat Nana turns to face us, and so does a younger
woman behind the steering wheel. “Ellery, Ezra, this is Melanie
Kilduff. Her family lives down the street from us. I have terrible night
vision, so Melanie was kind enough to drive. She used to babysit your
mother when she was young. You’ve probably heard the name.”
Ezra and I exchange wide-eyed glances. Yes. Yes, we have.
Sadie
left Echo Ridge when she was eighteen, and she’s only been back twice.
The first time was the year before we were born, when our grandfather
died from a heart attack. And the second time was five years ago, for
Melanie’s teenage daughter’s funeral.
Ezra
and I watched the Dateline special—“Mystery at Murderland”—at home
while our neighbor stayed with us. I was transfixed by the story of
Lacey Kilduff, the beautiful blond homecoming queen from my mother’s
hometown, found strangled in a Halloween theme park. Airport Andy was
right; the park’s owner changed its name from Murderland to Fright Farm a
few months later. I’m not sure the case would have gotten as much
national attention if the park hadn’t had such an on-the-nose name.
Or
if Lacey hadn’t been the second pretty teenager from Echo Ridge—and
from the same exact street, even—to make tragic headlines.
Sadie
wouldn’t answer any of our questions when she got back from Lacey’s
funeral. “I just want to forget about it,” she said whenever we asked.
Which is what she’s been saying about Echo Ridge our entire lives.
Ironic, I guess, that we ended up here anyway.
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