Set briefly in the U.S. — home to 16-year-old Jacob, who has just witnessed the violent death of a beloved member of his family — the tale moves to a small, foggy island off the coast of Wales, and time immediately gets tricky.

Peppered with a motley cast of “peculiar” children and the people who surround them, Riggs weaves a taught and haunting fantasy as clever as it is dark. Recommended for fans of the Beautiful Creatures trilogy by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, The Sister by Poppy Adams, or The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield, Miss Peregrine’s Home is an excellent place to repose on a hot summer day, provided you don’t mind periodically looking over your shoulder.

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This book was published by Crown Publishers in February 2011. For more information, visit the author’s website, which includes a properly creepy book trailer. (FTC Disclosure: This review was based on a copy of the book that I borrowed from the public library.)