The Hysterical Girls of St. Bernadette’s

Gr 9 Up–Khadijah stopped talking a long time ago, but her best friends haven’t given up on her. She still attends school at St. Bernadette’s Academy, a prestigious missionary school in Malaysia, and wishes things could go back to normal. Rachel is an overachiever, constantly hearing her mother’s voice in her head to study harder, sleep less, achieve more. But there’s more than that to life, and she wants to take a break and try acting for a change. But when the screaming begins, normal life is upended at St. Bernadette’s. One day, a girl simply starts screaming and it doesn’t stop. Over the course of months, more and more screamers emerge, with the school simply trying to push the phenomenon under the rug. Girls of every grade and type are affected, and Khadijah and Rachel are the only ones who seem to understand that there is some pattern in the school’s history leading them to this “hysteria.” A girl has disappeared before, but no one at the school wants to talk about it. A thrilling mix of ghost story and realism, this book manages to hit hard topics while not ignoring issues like Rachel’s fear of letting down her mom.