Book picks similar to
Black Hill Farm by Tim O'Rourke


young-adult
mystery
paranormal
tim-o-rourke

Insanity


Lauren Hammond - 2012
    Adelaide Carmichael and Damien Allen couldn’t be more opposite.Adelaide’s mother abandoned her when she was ten years old, leaving her to be raised by her abusive and alcoholic father.Damien on the other hand came from a wealthy family, was a local celebrity, and seemed to have a bright future ahead of him.Despite their differences, Adelaide and Damien were young, wild, and fiercely in love.And they had a plan.They were going to run away.Be together forever.And their plan was set in motion, until tragedy struck and for some reason, Adelaide wound up in The Oakhill Institution for the insane.Adelaide has no idea what she did to wind up at Oakhill, but she knows one thing for sure...She wants out.And after Damien follows her there to aid her in escaping, Adelaide slowly begins putting together the pieces of her memory that are missing.And it doesn’t take Adelaide long to figure out that sometimes...That one true love never dies.Warning:Do not read if you have a weak heart.

Awakening


Jeremy Laszlo - 2013
    But he never came back. With supplies running out and vital life support systems failing, Jack, Samantha, and Will have no choice but to ignore their father’s warnings and leave the vault. With no knowledge of what befell the world outside, or what they might expect once the door is opened, they find themselves in a world they do not recognize. Thrust into the remains of the world they remember, how will they survive on their own, not knowing what or who else remains amongst the ruins?

314


A.R. Wise - 2012
    She has a good life as a music teacher now, and might rekindle her relationship with her one true love. However, the number 314 haunts her, and threatens to bring her back to the day that her brother disappeared. When a reporter shows up, just days before March 14th, Alma realizes that her past is coming back to haunt her. What happened on March 14th, at 3:14, 16 years ago? No one but The Skeleton Man can remember.

Superman's Cape


Brian Spangler - 2012
    When Sara Connely is asked what life is like today, she answers with the simple words, ‘life goes on.’ The life she and her boys enjoyed the last dozen years is gone. Sara struggles to cope with the death of her husband and doing so with two young boys, and no money, is almost too much to ask.Life does go on, but when Sara’s oldest boy becomes lost in Croatan National Forest, life comes to a stop.Twelve-year-old Kyle Connely doesn’t know the woods. He doesn’t know the wildlife. He doesn’t know how to get home. Lost in the wilderness, he faces dangers the likes of which he has never seen. Kyle’s time is running out. A hurricane is looming, and in its path is the coastal forest he is trying to survive. Jacob Hanson has a gift. An intuition. An insightfulness. And it has helped him find success. But his gift turns into a curse as he becomes an unwilling participant in Kyle's plight.What Jacob Hanson doesn't know is he also holds the key to Sara’s past and the lifetime she lost with her husband.

Open Minds


Susan Kaye Quinn - 2011
    Zeros are outcasts who can’t be trusted, leaving her no chance with Raf, a regular mindreader and the best friend she secretly loves. When she accidentally controls Raf’s mind and nearly kills him, Kira tries to hide her frightening new ability from her family and an increasingly suspicious Raf. But lies tangle around her, and she’s dragged deep into a hidden world of mindjackers, where having to mind control everyone she loves is just the beginning of the deadly choices before her.TOP 5 FINALIST for 2012 Best Indie Book, Young Adult Fiction - The Kindle Book ReviewMINDJACK SERIES READING ORDEROpen Minds (Book 1)Closed Hearts (Book 2)Free Souls (Book 3)Locked Tight (Book 4)Cracked Open (Book 5)Broken Wide (Book 6)Mindjack Short Story Collection (Book 7)The Locksmith is a standalone novella that can be read independently of the trilogy and novellas.

Breath of Air


Katie Jennings - 2012
    She was born with a gift she didn’t understand. A gift so strange, so remarkable that she had kept it secret for as long as she could remember, despising that it made her different when all she wanted was to be normal, to belong. As an orphan, belonging to someone, anyone, would have been an incredible blessing, one she would have given up all that she had just to get a taste of. But the truth was that she didn’t belong in the orphanage in Virginia, or even in the United States. In fact, she didn’t belong with human beings at all. Because she wasn’t one of them, not really. She was something much more extraordinary. She could shift the direction of the wind, create billowing clouds out of nothing, and charm birds into dancing on her open palm. She belonged to an elite group of beings, responsible for preserving the balance of nature and the safety of Earth from an underworld that deserved to be feared, and needed to be controlled. And after years of being lost, she had at last been found, and now the truth of how she had ended up so far from home was becoming horribly clear to her. But there’s someone who doesn’t want her to return; someone who knows Capri was the only witness to an act of heinous treason and violent murder. And when she begins to search her memories for details of the night she was taken from her home, details that will implicate a killer, she finds herself the unwary target of an otherworldly dark force intent on silencing her by any means possible.

The Moonlit Mind


Dean Koontz - 2011
    . . both human and otherwise.Twelve-year-old Crispin has lived on the streets since he was nine—with only his wits and his daring to sustain him, and only his silent dog, Harley, to call his friend. He is always on the move, never lingering in any one place long enough to risk being discovered. Still, there are certain places he returns to. In the midst of the tumultuous city, they are havens of solitude: like the hushed environs of St. Mary Salome Cemetery, a place where Crispin can feel at peace—safe, at least for a while, from the fearsome memories that plague him . . . and seep into his darkest nightmares. But not only his dreams are haunted. The city he roams with Harley has secrets and mysteries, things unexplainable and maybe unimaginable. Crispin has seen ghosts in the dead of night, and sensed dimensions beyond reason in broad daylight. Hints of things disturbing and strange nibble at the edges of his existence, even as dangers wholly natural and earthbound cast their shadows across his path. Alone, drifting, and scavenging to survive is no life for a boy. But the life Crispin has left behind, and is still running scared from, is an unspeakable alternative . . . that may yet catch up with him.There is more to this world, and its darkest corners yet to be encountered, in this eBook’s special bonus: a spine-tingling excerpt from Dean Koontz’s forthcoming novel, 77 Shadow Street.

Captivated


E.M. Jade - 2011
    Then, I somehow ignored the water and only saw him. He looked like a dark angel on a cloud of mist holding his arms out to me. I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply. Then I jumped.” MindyMindy's new best friend, Markus Medina, witnesses Dean kill two people behind a club. Mindy has a hard time believing him, especially when he mentions that the bodies disappear. Poof! Into thin air. Markus decides he has to follow Dean around in order to get evidence that he's been killing people, so he doesn't sound like a nut to the police. Despite Marcus’ crazy theories about the possibility of Dean not being human. And not to mention the fact that he's dangerous. Mindy can't help that she may be falling in love with him. Even after hiding their feelings for each other from the world. Dean and Mindy being together stirs up dangers that neither of them could ever imagine. When she finds out about what Dean really is and the world he tried to keep her away from...it's already too late.

Envy


Gregg Olsen - 2011
    Evil lurks and strange things happen--and 15-year-olds Hayley and Taylor Ryan secretly use their wits and their telepathic “twin-sense” to uncover the truth about the town's victims and culprits.  Envy, the series debut, involves the mysterious death of the twins' old friend, Katelyn. Was it murder? Suicide? An accident? Hayley and Taylor are determined to find out--and as they investigate, they stumble upon a dark truth that is far more disturbing than they ever could have imagined.

The Harvesting


Melanie Karsak - 2012
    Raised by the town's medium, and dubbed the "weird" girl, the last thing she wants is to go home. When Layla gets a desperate phone call to return just as a mysterious outbreak sweeps the country, Layla's instincts urge her to go. Good thing, because the dead are rising. The town's residents, including the ex who jilted her, will need Layla's help if they hope to survive.

Ghost Shadow


Heather Graham - 2010
    They seek retribution…vengeance…to warn. Among the living, few intuit their presence.Katie O'Hara is one who can.As she’s drawn deeper and deeper into a gruesome years-old murder, whispered warnings from a spectral friend become more and more insistent. But Katie must uncover the truth: could David Beckett really be guilty of his fiancée’s murder?Worse – the body count’s rising on the Island of Bones, and the dead seem to be reenacting some macabre tableaux from history. The danger is increasing by the moment – especially as Katie finds herself irresistibly drawn to David, who may be responsible for more than just one killing….

Insomnia


J.R. Johansson - 2013
    After four years of sleeplessness, high school junior Parker Chipp can't take much more. Every night, instead of sleeping, he enters the dreams of the last person he's made eye contact with. If he doesn't sleep soon, Parker will die. Then he meets Mia. Her dreams, calm and beautifully uncomplicated, allow him blissful rest that is utterly addictive. But what starts out as a chance meeting turns into an obsession; Parker's furious desire for what he needs pushes him to extremes he never thought he'd go. And when someone begins to terrorizing Mia with twisted death threats, Parker's memory blackouts leave him doubting his own innocence.

Deadly Shadows


Jaycee Clark - 2004
    If she keeps to herself, she can’t get hurt. Haunted by the past, Jesslyn never again wants to experience the soul-shredding pain of losing loved ones.But a murder changes that.Aiden Kinncaid is running from his own secret loss. As the CEO of Kinncaid Enterprises, he travels to this remote Colorado resort town to oversee the opening of the new Highland Hotel. Though he’s not interested in any kind of relationship, he finds himself drawn to this temperamental, brown-eyed beauty. And her rough-edged attitude is a challenge to him.But whether or not either sought a relationship—they’ve found one. Aiden wants to protect Jesslyn even if she claims she can take care of herself, and she finds she can’t stop thinking about Aiden, even when he annoys her. Will they get their second chance at love and life before the killer eliminates one problem he doesn’t need?

Others


James Herbert - 1999
    He carries a secret about himself to which not even he has the answer . . .He is hired to find a missing baby. One that was taken away at birth . . . Or was it?His investigation takes him to a mysteriously located place called Perfect Rest. It is supposed to be a nursing home for the elderly . . . But is it?Here Dismas will discover the dark secret of the Others. And in an astonishing and spectacular finale he will resolve the enigma of his own existence . . .

The Scarlet Thread


D.S. Murphy - 2016
    After I saw my little brother’s death but failed to stop it, my parents abandoned me to a juvenile detention facility. I don’t let people touch me anymore. Not my fingertips, not my skin, not my heart. I make my own clothes by stitching together the donations we get; usually a bunch of crap that fits like a parachute. My sweater is a patchwork of different shades of inky, dark squares. I make plain gray skirts that hang to my knees, with cute or funny T-shirts sewed in. They clash ironically with my unsmiling face. My Allstar high-tops are black and frayed, like my soul. I also wear a chunk of brightly colored legos around my neck. My little brother was working on it the day he died. The day I failed to save him. It’s unfinished, so I’ll never know what it was meant to be. Most days, I just try to get by. But then I got a visit from a cute guy, who tricked me into giving up my secrets. He said I was special. That he needed me. For a while, I believed him. But once I found out what I could really do, I learned everybody wanted the power I possessed. The power to destroy deities. To kill gods. To end the world... or to save it. My heart is torn, and those I loved most betrayed me. I'm trying so hard to do what's right, but nobody can tell me what that is anymore, and the moral boundaries I'd always let define my life have been shattered. Whose rules should I obey now? Or do I have to make my own? The Scarlet Thread is a dark fantasy for fans of Greek mythology and Gothic romance. Fans of Fallen and Percy Jackson will be captivated by this mashup of fallen angels and forgotten gods.