An Indie Author Spotlight: Runaways by Etta Grace

There are certain books that feel like they slip a hand out of the mortal world, curl their fingers around your wrist, and tug you somewhere older, colder, and brimming with teeth. Runaways by Etta Grace is absolutely one of them. From the first page, it hums with a kind of storm-lit magic—wild and whimsical in a way that makes the woods look different when you step outside afterward.

At its core, this is a sister story, and that’s where it hits the hardest.

When Cecelia vanishes into a storm the night before Halloween, older sister Hannah doesn’t hesitate. She throws on their father’s green coat, pockets a steel knife, wraps her fingers around a red bracelet full of good memories, and heads into the woods. It’s such a simple setup, and yet Grace turns it into a beating heart of a quest, full of longing and fear and that bone-deep determination only siblings can spark in one another.

There’s a quote I kept thinking about the entire time I read: siblings—your first friend, your forever bond, and the one who knows you best. 

And another, which came to mind by the end of the book: always together but never apart, maybe in distance but never in heart. 

Hannah and Cecelia embody both so beautifully. Their bond is the anchor point of their entire world. In a story full of trickster glamour, courtly politics, and creatures who wear lies as easily as skin, that sibling love is the most trustworthy thing on the page.

And speaking of creatures: I need to talk about the Changeling. I won’t spoil a single detail but I will say this: the Changeling is mischievous and unsettling and brilliant, with this layered presence that turns her into a show-stealer. She's the kind of character you know you’d follow even though you should absolutely turn back. Books rarely give me a new character-obsession these days, but this one is a forever favorite.

If you grew up devouring The Spiderwick Chronicles or The Sisters Grimm, Runaways will scratch that same itch and then build something richer on top of it.

And the worldbuilding! Faerieland in this book feels untamed in the way all the best faerie realms do. It’s beautiful, yes, but dangerous and wild. The depiction of the Seelie and Unseelie courts is one of the strongest I’ve seen in recent YA fantasy. No info-dumping, no clunky lore—just a seamless unfolding of rules, expectations, politics, and strange, glittering dangers as Hannah navigates deeper into a world she only knows from stories. It makes you feel like you’re discovering everything with her, breath held, heart pounding.

Needless to say, if you want a faerie tale with teeth, a quest with heart, and worldbuilding that feels like moss under your feet and cold wind at your neck, pick this one up.

You can find it right here: Runaways