Katzenjammer
Katzenjammer by Francesca Zappia, published by HarperCollins Publishers in 2022, is a 290-page novel that delves into the unsettling experiences of Cat, a high school student trapped within the confines of her school. As the environment shifts ominously around her, with hallways that breathe and showers that run red, Cat grapples with her reality and the transformations occurring among her peers. This narrative intertwines themes of family, love, and tragedy, exploring the masks people wear, both literally and metaphorically.
Readers will find a haunting tale that alternates between past and present, revealing Cat’s struggle to escape her nightmarish surroundings. The story incorporates elements of magical realism and horror, as Cat confronts her own identity and the memories that bind her to her school. With a focus on coming-of-age experiences and the challenges faced by loners and outcasts, Katzenjammer presents a suspenseful journey that invites reflection on personal transformation and the nature of one’s past. The edition includes interior illustrations by the author, enhancing the immersive experience of this eerie narrative.
Official synopsis Publisher
“An eerie, savage novel.” –Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books
American Horror Story meets the dark comedy of Kafka’s The Metamorphosis as Cat searches for a way to escape her high school. A tale of family, love, tragedy, and masks–the ones others make for us, and the ones we make for ourselves. Katzenjammer will haunt fans of Chelsea Pitcher’s This Lie Will Kill You and E. Lockhart’s We Were Liars.
Cat lives in her high school. She never leaves, and for a long time her school has provided her with everything she needs. But now things are changing. The hallways contract and expand along with the school’s breathing, and the showers in the bathroom run a bloody red. Cat’s best friend is slowly turning into cardboard, and instead of a face, Cat has a cat mask made of her own hardened flesh.
Cat doesn’t remember why she is trapped in her school or why half of them–Cat included–are slowly transforming. Escaping has always been the one impossibility in her school’s upside-down world. But to save herself from the eventual self-destruction all the students face, Cat must find the way out. And to do that, she’ll have to remember what put her there in the first place.
Using chapters alternating between the past and the present, acclaimed author Francesca Zappia weaves a spine-tingling, suspenseful, and haunting story about tragedy and the power of memories. Fans of Marieke Nijkamp’s This Is Where It Ends and Karen McManus’s One of Us Is Lying will lose themselves in the pages of this novel–or maybe in the treacherous hallways of the school.
Includes interior illustrations from the author.
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