A Missing Student Isn’t the Same When She Returns In This Excerpt From The Changing Man
Dark academia is all the rage in the world of YA fiction right now—with good reason. A subgenre that allows readers to explore everything from social issues to straight up horror, it’s a setting that’s perfect for digging into the larger questions of identity and belonging that are so crucial to the young adult experience. And this is exactly what Tomi Oyemakinde’s debut novel The Changing Man sets out to do.
An atmospheric YA thriller, it follows the story of Ife Adebola, a young British Nigerian girl who is accepted into an urban scholarship program at the overachieving, upper-class Nithercott School. She arrives right after another student named Leon has gone missing, but doesn’t think anything of it…at least not until another classmate, Malika, starts acting strangely after a brief disappearance.
Because like so many posh boarding schools before it, Nithercott is hiding some dark secrets in its expensive halls, and the rumors surrounding its local urban legend, a figure known as the Changing Man who targets the lonely and ostracized, are particularly disturbing.
But, as Ife is slowly beginning to understand, that doesn’t mean they might not be true.
Here’s how the publisher describes the story.
If it was left to her, Ife Adebola wouldn’t be starting at Nithercott School. Because despite being in the Urban Achievers scholarship program, her parents can barely afford the tuition. No matter who, like her classmate Bijal, is trying to be friends with her or how much the prestigious boarding school tries to pull her in, Ife is determined not to get caught up in any of it.
But when another student, Malika, begins acting strange, Ife can’t help but wonder if there’s more going on at Nithercott than she realizes. Could there be any truth to the school’s decades-old legend of the Changing Man? Is there any connection to the missing older brother of her classmate, Ben?
As more questions arise, Ife has no choice but to team up with Ben and Bijal to investigate. But can the trio act quickly enough to uncover who is behind everything, before one—or all—of them is the Changing Man’s next victim?
The Changing Man won’t hit shelves until September 26, but we’re excited to give you a sneak peek at the story right now.
The day wobbles by, slowly crumpling my chest like fabric after the thread is pulled too tight. I’m too distracted by the what ifs to focus on anything. Before I know it, I am in detention, and Malika is still a ghost.