The gap between school girl and student is wider for Ella, because she's lost her boyfriend in a car accident. Coming to terms with life, she spends time with family and friends, and heads off to college. Her best pal Josie is going to the same college in Vermont, a long way from California, so they make preparations and end up rooming together. Their dorm is co-ed and Josie just wants to go to parties and join societies based on how good-looking the guys are. Ella's not so sure, but she's an adult now. She can spot a creep. Helpful Jack and flirty, pushy Tristan seem polar opposites, and she's in no hurry to get any closer.

In THE WANDERERS, Tristan keeps trying to get Ella's attention and since Jack has hooked up with Josie, Ella reluctantly sees a good side of Tristan. But she's been plagued by unpleasant dreams since that car crash, in which she sees a watcher in the road, and now she starts to see glowing eyes in dark places, following her. How much of this is reality? And when one of the boys suddenly attacks her, why can't Ella remember it the next day?

Jessica Miller has written an intense story of young people without much adult supervision, as though once people turn eighteen they are considered worldly wise and capable of dealing with all crises. From broken glass injuries to reckless drinking, things do go wrong and peer pressure is apparently more important than exam results. The paranormal happenings only really start halfway through the tale. After a student has been found dead in a pool of blood and the dorms are closed, I was a little surprised that the two girls should check into a hotel and book spa treatment, manicures, pedicures, facials, massages. And buy new dresses. Suddenly Ella is told a family secret which turns her life around, and the story heads off in a whole new direction. I thought her parents should have told her before, at least when she turned eighteen.

THE WANDERERS is very much a tale of two halves, beginning as a college story and turning the corner to paranormal, so readers hoping for otherworldly action had better be patient. The mood shifts to horror and there are no guarantees of anyone coming out alive. Young adult readers might like this tale of college with a difference.