Synopsis

A brilliant, eccentric teenager must solve a series of puzzles left behind by her dead father in this debut that features codes, riddles, and a plot that ingeniously mixes fact and fiction.

When seventeen-year-old Arizona’s mother goes missing on a family trip, Arizona tells herself not to worry. Until she finds her family’s Airstream ransacked—and the ominous note on the counter. Incredibly, impossibly, her mother has been kidnapped.

Even more bizarre are the terms of the The kidnappers believe that Arizona’s dead father took some sort of great secret to his grave—and to get her mother back safely, Arizona must now uncover it for them.

If Arizona were a “normal” teenager, she’d have no idea what to do. Luckily, Arizona’s anything but normal. Like her father, she’s more comfortable with books than with people, and inordinately fond of puzzles, codes, and riddles—and she soon realizes that the trail begins with a cipher that points her West, to the peaks of the Sierra Nevada mountains.

Her dog Mojo at her side, Arizona sets off in the Airstream to uncover the truth and pursue her mother’s return on her own terms. Yet her journey grows far stranger than she could have imagined, as she finds herself cracking codes and solving riddles, poring through pages of ancient texts, poking through forgotten corners of U.S. history, and uncovering mysteries hidden in plain sight in the Western landscape—all on the hunt for an impossible, centuries-old prize.

Even as she races to stay a step ahead of her adversaries and wonders at her father’s hidden life, she begins to realize that navigating the outside world on her own isn’t as terrifying as she thought—and finding other people who understand her isn’t so impossible after all.

Amazon * B&N * Bookshop * Kobo

Review

This book has many features that I tend to love when reading a suspense/thriller novel – puzzles, interesting characters, and danger.

Arizona and her mother are off to spread her father’s ashes. However, her mother is kidnapped, and Arizona is tasked with deciphering clues to ensure her mother’s release. For a seventeen-year-old, she is pretty smart and knows her way around search engines and the like to uncover the information she needs to solve the riddles. While it isn’t stated, it is obvious she is neurodivergent, which helps when solving the riddles, but hinders her in trusting others or making friends.

I did enjoy trying to solve the riddles, but I could tell I was no match for Arizona or the author. The ciphers were very cerebral and not meant for the average reader. I believe I read that a lot of this information was true, and if you had the desire to look it up on the internet that you would find the same information. Some poems lead Arizona to the next clue, once she has deciphered them. These poems are repeated, which is both a good and a bad thing. Good because I wouldn’t remember it, but bad because I feel like it was filler. I also question whether a seventeen-year-old would be tasked with helping save her mother, no matter how brilliant she was in uncovering the clues.

I did enjoy the book and how everything came together. Furthermore, I even appreciated the burgeoning friendship between Lily and Arizona. I think that is something Arizona was lacking, and this helped shape her future.

We give this book 4 paws up.

About the Author

K. A. Merson is a vaguely reclusive writer who lives in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains, along with a patient spouse, a malevolent boxer dog, and an Airstream trailer.