#BookTour: Bad Girl Gone by Temple Mathews

  Sixteen year-old Echo Stone awakens in a cold sweat in a dark room, having no idea where she is or how she got there. But she soon finds out she s in Middle House, an orphanage filled with mysteriously troubled kids.

There s just one problem: she s not an orphan. Her parents are very much alive.

She explains this to everyone, but no one will listen. After befriending a sympathetic (and handsome) boy, Echo is able to escape Middle House and rush home, only to discover it sealed off by crime scene tape and covered in the evidence of a terrible and violent crime. As Echo grapples with this world-shattering information, she spots her parents driving by and rushes to flag them down. Standing in the middle of street, waving her arms to get their attention, her parents car drives right through her.

She was right. Her parents are alive but she s not.

She s a ghost, just like all the other denizens of Middle House. Desperate to somehow get her life back and reconnect with her still-alive boyfriend, Echo embarks on a quest to solve her own murder. As the list of suspects grows, the quest evolves into a journey of self-discovery in which she learns she wasn t quite the girl she thought she was. In a twist of fate, she s presented with one last chance to reclaim her life and must make a decision which will either haunt her or bless her forever.

Temple Mathews is an author and screenwriter with several films to his credit, including Disney’s Return to Neverland, The Little Mermaid 2: Return to the Sea, and Mickey’s Once Upon a Christmas. He wrote Aloha Scooby Doo for Warner Bros. and Picture This for MGM. He is also the author of The New Kid trilogy.

Awakening 

When I tried to remember exactly how I came to be lying in

the cold black room, my mind couldn’t focus.

I could feel myself slowly climbing upward, clawing my

way out of the clutches of a nightmare. This was usually a

good feeling, because you knew you were just dreaming, and

the nightmare was over. Except this time it wasn’t. My hands

felt clammy. I gripped the sheets until I knew my knuckles

must be white. Help me, I thought. Somebody please help me.

I had no idea where I was, and for a terrifying second I

couldn’t even remember who I was. But then I remembered my

name. Echo. Echo Stone. My real name is Eileen. When I was

a toddler, I waddled around repeating everything my parents

said and they called me “Echo,” and it just stuck.

Awakening

Remembering my name and how I got it kick-started my

brain. I knew who I was. I remembered that I was sixteen years

old and lived in Kirkland, Washington, with my mom and dad.

It was all coming back to me. Mom was a dentist and Dad

taught middle school English. Good, I could remember parts

of my life. But I was still in a dark, cold room and had no idea

how I got there. I held back a scream, my chest tightening. Don’t

lose it, Echo, keep it together, I told myself. Calm down, think good

thoughts.

I pictured Andy, my boyfriend. Six feet tall, broad shoul-

ders, blue eyes, and long golden-brown hair. He loved to feed

me cookie bites and called me his rabbit. I called him Wolfie.

Sometimes he got the hiccups for no reason at all and usually

laughed them away. Thinking of Andy momentarily made me

feel warm inside, even though the room was freezing.

Where was I? I was shivering and yet also bathed in sweat,

my skin slick with it. I clutched for my trusty Saint Christo-

pher necklace. But it wasn’t there. Mom gave it to me to protect

me when I traveled. Would it protect me now? I would never

have lost it. The chain must have broken. And then I had an

ugly thought. What if someone had ripped it from my neck? I

shuddered. Where are you, Andy? I need you!

I opened my eyes as wide as I could. It was pitch black. My

pounding heart told me, This isn’t some nightmare—it’s real. I

hugged myself and breathed deeply, trying to calm my nerves.

My shoulders were tight. I rubbed the sheets beneath me. The

ones at home in my bed were soft. These were stiff and coarse.

I was somewhere completely and painfully foreign. In my head

I was talking to myself in a rapid voice, my fear voice: What is

this?—what is this?—what is this?

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Posted in: St. Martin's Griffin, Tour