The Steps

By: Wendelin Van Draanen

Narrated by: Rachel Yong

Riverdale meets The Queen’s Gambit in this fun, twisty thriller by an Edgar Award-winning author, featuring a deliciously dysfunctional family with dark secrets and shifting alliances.

Fourteen-year-old chess whiz Ruby Vossen tries to keep to herself. She refuses to be a pawn in her wealthy family’s web of deception.

But ever since Ruby’s mother and aunt died in a car wreck, the battle lines drawn within the Vossen clan have ruled her life. Ruby’s father and uncle became irreparably estranged, and within months, Ruby’s cousin/BFF was banished from her life, her father remarried, and she wound up with a gold-digging stepmom who has two teens of her own—The Steps.

So when strange and dangerous things begin happening on the Vossen estate, Ruby sees only one logical explanation: The Steps are scheming to inherit the Vossen fortune. And as things get more and more intense, it seems like killing is in their playbook.

Luckily, Ruby has her own playbook, and she’s not about to go down without a fight. She’ll even break her dad’s rules to get her cousin back on her side of the chessboard . . . It’s time to check-mate The Steps before they can finish the Vossens off.

Secrets, lies, and lethal threats abound in this clever, quirky thriller by the award-winning, bestselling author of Flipped and the Sammy Keyes mysteries.

©2025 Wendelin Van Draanen (P)2025 Dreamscape Media

Twists, curves, and grips

From the beginning this book envelopes the reader in a tight, yet flexible cacoon of trauma, drama, and deep secrets hidden behind the appearance of normalcy, family, and innocence, at least through childrens' eyes. The explosion of betrayal, both real and percieved driven by denied strong manic that refused to be controlled takes the reader inside this family's prison of competition for favor and need to be "loved best".