Seventeen-year-old Alice and her mother have spent most of Alice's life on the run, always one step ahead of the strange misfortune that follows them. But when Alice's grandmother, the reclusive author of a book of dark fairy tales, dies alone at her estate, Hazel Wood, Alice learns just how bad her luck can really get. Her mother is kidnapped by a figure who claims to be from the cruel supernatural world where her grandmother's stories take place. Alice's only clue is the message her mother left behind: Stay away from Hazel Wood. To get her mother back, Alice must first travel to Hazel Wood and then into the world where her grandmother's stories began.