Keija Parssinen on her novel “The Unraveling of Mercy Louis”

“The Unraveling of Mercy Louis" tells the fascinating story of a community that’s nearly torn apart following the discovery of an abandoned baby in a dumpster. A witch hunt ensures and the girls at a local high school soon begin developing mysterious twitches and tics, which quickly intensify. Eventually, the girls in the town are acting as if they’re possessed, thrashing around on the floor or grunting like animals. As strange as it all sounds, Parssinen says the book was inspired by a real episode of mass hysteria in Le Roy, New York.