FREEING LINHURST
Get the First Book in the Series
BUY NOW
Buy In-Store — Support Your Local Retailer
Towne Book Centre, Collegeville, PA
Ideas Bookstore, Kimberton, PA
Order Online
Reviews
“memorable for children and adults alike.”
Read the Full Review @ Self Publishing Review
“a deftly crafted novel with an important underlying message.”
Midwest Book Review
Freeing Linhurst “ratchet up the spookiness.”
Online Book Club
A Journey to Uncover the Truth
Linhurst State School and Hospital is the abandoned mental asylum in the small town of Spring Dale. It’s been shrouded in mystery as long as Jack Alexander can remember. Before her untimely passing, his mother — an investigative journalist for the local paper — had begun to inquire about the truth behind its crumbling walls. Devastated, Jack is determined to uncover the truth about Linhurst no matter what. As he digs deeper, Jack unearths powerful secrets that have long been buried by patronizing adults and a modern day plot that threatens to destroy the property in just days and erase the memories of those who once called Linhurst home. Working against the clock — and the better judgement of his best friend Celia . . . Jack slips into the abandoned property…on Halloween night. What they discover could destroy Linhurst forever or spark a revolution that could change the future of Spring Dale.
Freeing Linhurst is a young adult novel set on the property Linhurst State School and Hospital. Based on Pennhurst State School and Hospital, some call this the “Pennhurst Book.” Linhurst is set in the quaint town of Spring Dale, inspired by Spring City, Pennsylvania. Just across the river from Royersford, PA, the story is about two high school teenagers who embark on a journey to discover what lies beyond the walls of the abandoned mental hospital/institution where former patients and residents were once locked away and now roam the streets.
With claims of ghosts and spirits haunting the premises, Jack Alexander can’t help but feel there is something more to the complete closure of the campus for so many decades now.
Freeing Linhurst is based on asylums like Pennhurst State School and Hospital and Byberry State Hospital, but not like some might think. While so many people interested in mental facilities and how deinstitutionalization left these places vacant but remaining–decaying and withering as a memory of how we once treated those with mental illnesses–this book captures the energy of these terrible places from the viewpoint of determined, brave and curious teenagers who carefully begin to challenge the adults in their town who put those people there.
The young adult book novel Freeing Linhurst was written and illustrated by Al Cassidy with the editing help of Rachel Elizabeth Miner and Tracy Seybold. All images copyright ©2017 Al Cassidy. All rights reserved.
Freeing Linhurst is a fictitious place and is not to be confused with the Lyndhurst Mansion in Lyndhurst, New Jersey (NJ), which also has hauntings and spirits. FreeingLyndhurst.com is also FreeingLinhurst.com
Publication Date: April 5, 2017
320 pages, 72,000 words
ISBN:978-0-692-87234-5
Ebook ISBN: 978-0-692-98115-3