SOLVED. YA novel - creepy/sci-fi/fantasy, field that is an ocean in an alternate dimension (more details below) [s]

[Sam]

I know I don't have a lot to go on, but the novel is loosely about a young adult (don't know if male or female) that lives in a small town in the middle of the U.S. (Ohio? Wyoming?), and discovers an alternate universe that he/she then has to protect his/her world from. I probably read this book between 2000-2005.
Specific details I do remember:
Town is next to a very large field of wheat/dry grass that the hero finds a seashell in (and doesn't know why). There's also an abandoned lighthouse in the field. Turns out that in the alternate universe the field is actually an ocean. There's a chase scene in that lighthouse at one point between the hero and some weirdly deformed creature from the alternate world.
On the edge of town (next to the field), there's a creepy old woman's house who has a whole front yard full of pinwheels (I'm not 100% on the pinwheels).
There's a hotel within the town that has a haunted room from when a man committed suicide in it.
Please help!

[SamSpayedPI]

Not all of the details mesh, but maybe The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman?

[Bitsy]

Sounds like the Abarat series by Clive Barker. Abarat

[Mir]

Abarat definitely has that setting, I remember the old lady with the pinwheel garden. It's in the midwest in a town that does chicken farming. The MC is a girl named Candy or Cindy. I think the ocean in the other world is named Isabella.

[Sam]

Bitsy wrote: "Sounds like the Abarat series by Clive Barker. Abarat"

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! That is definitely it! Ready to reread it now. ;)

[Sam]

Miriam wrote: "Abarat definitely has that setting, I remember the old lady with the pinwheel garden. It's in the midwest in a town that does chicken farming. The MC is a girl named Candy or Cindy. I think the oce..."

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! That is definitely it! Ready to reread it now. ;)