On Marin’s island, sunrise doesn’t come every twenty-four hours—it comes every twenty-eight years. Now the sun is just a sliver of light on the horizon. The weather is turning cold and the shadows are growing long.
Because sunset triggers the tide to roll out hundreds of miles, the islanders are frantically preparing to sail south, where they will wait out the long Night.
Marin and her twin brother, Kana, help their anxious parents ready the house for departure. Locks must be taken off doors. Furniture must be arranged. Tables must be set. The rituals are puzzling—bizarre, even—but none of the adults in town will discuss why it has to be done this way.
Just as the ships are about to sail, a teenage boy goes missing—the twins’ friend Line. Marin and Kana are the only ones who know the truth about where Line’s gone, and the only way to rescue him is by doing it themselves. But Night is falling. Their island is changing.
And it may already be too late.
Author
Jake Halpern
Jake Halpern is an acclaimed journalist, author, and radio producer who has written for several publications including The New Yorker and The New York Times Magazine. As a contributor at NPR, Jake produced one of the most listened-to episodes of This American Life. He co-wrote the Dormia series with Peter Kujawinski and is the author of Bad Paper, a nonfiction book for adults.
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Peter Kujawinski
For eighteen years, Peter Kujawinski was an American diplomat, on assignment in places like Israel, Haiti, France, and at the UN in New York. Most recently, he was the US Consul General in western Canada, which included Alberta, Saskatchewan, and the Northwest Territories. While working as a diplomat, he started to write for adults and children. He is a contributor to the New York Times, and with coauthor Jake Halpern, Peter wrote Nightfall and the Dormia trilogy (Dormia, World’s End, and Shadow Tree). He lives in Chicago with his family.
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