TO STEAL FROM THIEVES

In an alternate 19th-century England, the banning of alchemology—the use of magic to alter mechanical devices—has driven buyers and alchemologists to the dark market.

When Zaria Mendoza’s father died, she inherited his alchemology notes and a list of illegal commissions. Completing the outstanding orders allows 18-year-old Zaria to scrape by, but manipulating magic comes at a steep cost to her health. Desperate to be rid of her father’s debts and escape London’s slums with her best friend, Jules Zhao, Zaria accepts an offer from Kane Durante, a young man tasked with stealing a necklace from the Great Exhibition of 1851. Failure isn’t an option for Kane, the adopted son of Alexander Ward, who rules the city’s underbelly. Kane has grimly accepted his fate as Ward’s successor, but he jumps at the chance to free Fletcher Collins, his only friend, from Ward’s control, something Ward promises in exchange for the necklace. Much of the book is spent exploring Zaria’s and Kane’s motives through secret-laden third-person chapters that reveal the pair’s feelings of unworthiness in relation to their friends. The story lightly addresses themes of economic inequality and British imperialism as it inches its way toward a heist that unfolds in a flurry of nail-biting twists and turns. The cast is ethnically diverse: Zaria had a Spanish father and English mother, Kane’s parents were Italian, Jules is British Chinese, and Fletcher is Irish.

For patient readers seeking a moody, character-driven fantasy.