"Where do you look for someone who's never really there?
Always on a staircase but never on a stair"

I liked this book more than I thought I would when I started reading it. Ellingham academy is a school dedicated to providing free education to, especially talented individuals. It was started by Albert Ellingham whose wife and daughter were kidnapped and supposedly killed by someone who makes riddles signed 'Truly, Devious'. Many years later Stevie, a budding crime enthusiast, is invited to join the academy. She hopes to not only receive special training in this remote and mysterious institution but to also solve the case of the Ellinghams. But with such a strange set of characters that make up the student body things are sure to go astray especially when theres another unsolved death along with another chilling riddle.

The characters all took time to grow on me. Cause the whole lot of them were introduced in such a short space of time, not to mention their relationships with each other. The plot is generally just fast enough in pace that it doesn't get boring. I liked the back and forth shifts between the older case and the current story. And the brief reports and police interviews definitely made the writing more interesting. But that ending though. That changed things for me; so much left hanging, so much to look forward to in the next book!