Eddie's books disappear. His older brother Marshall's Pop-Tarts vanish. Creaking stairs, thumping walls and more missing objects cause bitter accusations and screaming denials between the brothers. Their parents can't understand their kids' hostility, nor why things aren't always where they left them. Eavesdropping just out of sight, the girl in the walls chides herself to be more careful in this disquieting coming-of-age story.
Just outside New Orleans, 11-year-old Elise wanders barefoot away from a car accident toward the house she grew up in, where her father taught her to explore the crawlspaces. Elise enters without a key, slipping deftly behind the walls. Nick and Laura Mason live there now with their sons. Eddie spends his time reading novels of fantasy and myths while Marshall sticks to death metal music and pushups. Elise roams the house while the family is out. She's cautious, but eating and reading are essentials. Eddie isn't sure if Elise is real or imaginary, but Marshall befriends a guy online named Traust who swears there are people living within the walls of houses all over the country. Traust offers to capture the Mason resident trespasser as long as he can keep her. Elise can either leave immediately and live, or stay to fight for the only place she ever felt loved. Suddenly she's out of options--a hurricane overflows the levees and Elise's beloved childhood home lies directly in the path of destruction.
A.J. Gnuse's first novel, Girl in the Walls, gathers a damaged, plucky tween and an angst-ridden family and throws a hellacious storm at them, but still lets a little hope peek from behind the darkest clouds. --Paul Dinh-McCrillis, freelance reviewer