York: The Shadow Cipher

When their (alternate reality) New York City apartment building is bought by a scheming real-estate developer, seventh-grade twins Tess and Theo Biedermann and their neighbor Jaime Cruz devise a plan to solve the Old York Cipher and thus save their home. The Cipher had been created in the nineteenth century by the brilliant Morningstarr twins (after whom Tess and Theo were named), inventors of the city's "mechanical wizardry"--streets paved with solar panels, metal caterpillars that clean the Underway trains, and elevators that go in every direction--who then disappeared without a trace. As Tess, Theo, and Jaime take a fresh look at the Cipher, a new path of enticing and dangerous clues leads them deeper into the Morningstarrs' mystery and closer to treacherous villains. Ruby's nuanced trio of protagonists strikes a balance of emotional vulnerability (the twins coping with their grandfather's onset of dementia, Jaime with his father's increasing absence, and all three with the impending loss of their home) and resilience. The equally thoughtful vision of an alternative New York, both historical and present-day, pulsates right off the page, with geography, history, and steampunk-esque machines thoroughly integrated into the thrum of a strange but recognizable city. Weaving one web of secrets even as it works to unravel another, Ruby's story will have both mystery and sci-fi fans reading and rereading in anticipation of the next installment. anastasia m. collins