Hide (novel)

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Hide is a horror thriller by American author Kiersten White, published in 2022 by Del Rey. The story follows fourteen people lured to an abandoned amusement park in Asterion to play a deadly hide-and-seek game for a $50,000 prize. The contestants include a writer, a gas station attendant, a jewelry maker, aspiring influencers, an unemployed office worker, a military veteran, and the sole survivor of a father slaughtering his entire family. Each day they must hide from sunrise to sunset, and while they can team up to sabotage others, only one person can win and a leather-bound journal offers a bonus if found. As the days go by, the players realize the contest is a trap: the prize doesn’t exist, and they are feeding an ancient inhuman entity summoned by fourteen townspeople in the early 1900s.

The townspeople sacrificed their descendants every seven years to feed the creature, using the park and the game to attract victims. One by one the contestants are killed until three escape—Mack, Ava, and LeGrand—and confront the game coordinators, bringing them back to the park. Mack uses her blood to lure the entity, intending for it to feed on the coordinators instead of the remaining players. Ava and LeGrand blow open the gate, freeing the entity. The ending is left open to interpretation: the cycle may continue with new victims or end with the creature free.

White came up with Hide after learning of an adult hide-and-seek competition in an abandoned Italian resort town. The novel marks a shift from her young adult work, being written for adults and taking about three years to complete. It was released in hardback and e-book on May 24, 2022, with an audiobook read by Emma Galvin. A paperback followed in 2023. The UK edition appeared in 2022 from Penguin Books, and a French translation, Cache-cache mortel, released in 2023. A graphic novel adaptation by Ten Speed Graphic released on September 12, 2023, with art by Veronica and Andy Fish and script by Scott Peterson. In 2023 Universal Television and Peacock picked up TV rights, with Ingrid Escajeda attached to write the pilot and serve as an executive producer. Critics generally praised the atmosphere, setting, and writing, though some readers wished for more emphasis on human evil rather than supernatural horror.