Truly Devious
A Mystery
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Truly Devious
Buy Now for $31.46
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Narrated by:
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Kate Rudd
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Written by:
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Maureen Johnson
About this listen
New York Times bestselling author Maureen Johnson weaves a delicate tale of murder and mystery in the first book of a striking new series, perfect for fans of Agatha Christie and E. Lockhart.
Ellingham Academy is a famous private school in Vermont for the brightest thinkers, inventors, and artists. It was founded by Albert Ellingham, an early twentieth century tycoon, who wanted to make a wonderful place full of riddles, twisting pathways, and gardens. “A place,” he said, “where learning is a game.”
Shortly after the school opened, his wife and daughter were kidnapped. The only real clue was a mocking riddle listing methods of murder, signed with the frightening pseudonym “Truly, Devious.” It became one of the great unsolved crimes of American history.
True-crime aficionado Stevie Bell is set to begin her first year at Ellingham Academy, and she has an ambitious plan: She will solve this cold case. That is, she will solve the case when she gets a grip on her demanding new school life and her housemates: the inventor, the novelist, the actor, the artist, and the jokester.
But something strange is happening. Truly Devious makes a surprise return, and death revisits Ellingham Academy. The past has crawled out of its grave. Someone has gotten away with murder.
The two interwoven mysteries of this first book in the Truly Devious series dovetail brilliantly, and Stevie Bell will continue her relentless quest for the murderers in books two and three.
Publishers Weekly Best Books of 2018 * Junior Library Guild Selection * 2019 YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults Nomination * 2019 ALA's Best Fiction for Young Adults Nomination * Chicago Public Library Best of the Best Books 2018 * Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Young Adult Fiction 2018 * 2018 Nerdy Book Club Young Adult Winner * Seventeen Best YA Book of 2018 * Lincoln Award Nominee * 2020-2021 South Carolina Book Awards Nominee * 2020 Pennsylvania Young Readers' Choice Award Winner
I liked that there was a mystery happening right now, but also an unsolved mystery from 1936 that she is trying to solve!
Highly recommend!
Jumping into the next one right now!
Holy cliffhangers Batman!
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I would like this trilogy a lot better if it weren’t for the extremely problematic romance subplot between Stevie, the protagonist, and David, the undercover rich bad boy with a terrible attitude and a massive chip on his shoulder. No, seriously, I would hesitate to recommend this to an actual youth/teenager because of how unhealthy the relationship was. It’s just getting started in this installment, and it gets much worse, but it’s bad enough. A relationship based on lies, obfuscations and suspicion, built on a foundation of shared trauma. They don’t even /like/ each other. It was unnecessary and it added nothing of value to the plot.
It ruins what would otherwise be a pretty good YA/teen mystery.
The other thing is, the characters are largely one-dimensional. It's like they've each been allowed to have two or maybe three traits, and that's it. Stevie likes true crime, doesn't care about her appearance and has an anxiety disorder. Janelle is queer, cheerful and good at building things. Nate is a curmudgeon with touch-aversion and crippling writers block. It's not the wooorst, but it's not great, and it makes it hard to really get invested.
I will say, though, the 1930s plot is pretty great, and it's the reason why I finished the trilogy.
ok
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The story appears to be clever and well told (at least initially) however I felt very let down by the ending. I agree with previous reviews that it's appropriate to carry elements of a mystery through a series but that there needs to be some resolution within individual books. It feels jarring and a bit of a cheap trick. So much so that I am not inclined to read the next ones.
There were some ridiculous and improbable elements that bothered me. How Stevie manages to ignore the message left on her wall by 'Devious', chalking it up to lack of sleep, heightened anxiety or what have you. As well as how she, for far too long, seems not even to consider the idea that the death of her fellow student was a murder and not an accident. (especially when paired with the message on her wall). These elements seemed out of keeping for the intelligent and intuitive teenager that is painted as a bit of a genius of crime.
All in all, the writing is better than average for the genre with creative detail, but the plot and pacing need some work. And please, oh please, a different narrator!!
Truly terrible narration
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Truly Disappointing
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