Steps

By: Wendelin Van Draanen

Published by Holiday House, Incorporated, 2025

<b><i>Riverdale</i> meets <i>The Queen's Gambit</i> in this fun, twisty thriller by an Edgar Award-winning author, featuring a deliciously dysfunctional family with dark secrets and shifting alliances.</b><br> <br> Fourteen-year-old chess whiz Ruby Vossen tries to keep to herself. She refuses to be a pawn in her wealthy family's web of deception.<br> <br> But ever since Ruby's mother and aunt died in a car wreck, the battle lines drawn within the Vossen clan have ruled her life. Ruby's father and uncle became irreparably estranged, and within months, Ruby's cousin/BFF was banished from her life, her father remarried, and she wound up with a gold-digging stepmom who has two teens of her own--The Steps. <br> <br> So when strange and dangerous things begin happening on the Vossen estate, Ruby sees only one logical explanation: The Steps are scheming to inherit the Vossen fortune. And as things get more and more intense, it seems like killing is in their playbook. <br> <br> Luckily, Ruby has her own playbook, and she's not about to go down without a fight. She'll even break her dad's rules to get her cousin back on her side of the chessboard . . . It's time to check-mate The Steps before they can finish the Vossens off.<br> <br> Secrets, lies, and lethal threats abound in this clever, quirky thriller by the award-winning, bestselling author of <i>Flipped</i> and the Sammy Keyes mysteries.