Pennies
By (Author) Lora Senf
Illustrated by Alfredo Cceres
Simon & Schuster
Atheneum Books for Young Readers
16th December 2025
United States
Children
Fiction
Childrens / Teenage fiction: Family and home stories
Childrens / Teenage personal and social topics: Families and family members
Childrens / Teenage fiction: Friendship stories
Childrens / Teenage personal and social topics: Friends and friendships
Hardback
384
Width 140mm, Height 210mm, Spine 17mm
One hundred years prior to the events of The Clackity, four best friends are drawn into a deadly scheme when they set out to investigate the strange disappearances taking place in the eerie town of Blight Harbor in this spine-chilling middle grade adventure.
Its June of 1921 and best friends Mae, Lark, Brigid, and Claret have plans for the perfect summer. Between riding their bikes to the enchanted lake and decorating their fort for its resident ghost, the girls are a busy bunch. But when they discover a door in the forest floor that leads to an alternate world with purple skies and fearsome creatures, everything takes a turn for the worse.
Someone else has already been through that door, and its triggered something incredibly dangerous. Maybe deadly.
Back in Blight Harbor, strange disappearances are taking place. The most worrisome being that of Brigids cousin, who has been spending an awful lot of time with the unusual and untrustworthy John Jeffrey Pope. As the girls uncover the eerie world that lives right beneath their feet, will they find their missing friend, or will the most treacherous man in Blight Harbor get to them first
Lora Senf is a writer of dark and twisty stories for all ages. She is the author ofThe Clackity,Bram Stoker Award winnerThe Nighthouse Keeper, The Loneliest Place, and Pennies.She credits her love of words to her parents and to the public library that was walking distance from her childhood home. Lora finds inspiration for her writing in her childrens retellings of their dreams, on road trips through Montana, and most recently while reminiscing about summer days spent on her bike. She lives in eastern Washington with her husband, their twins, and two remarkably lazy cats. Visit her atLoraSenf.com.