Magic for Liars

DEBUT Oakland-based PI Ivy Gamble chases adulterous partners and money-hungry families, until a new client asks her to investigate the death of a health teacher at the Osthorne Academy for Young Mages, where Ivy's estranged twin sister, Tabitha, works. Tabitha possesses magic in spades, but Ivy does not. The headmaster at the school insists that the teacher's death is not accidental, and if that's true, someone on the grounds is a killer. Ivy grudgingly takes the investigation, uncovering both typical and unusual scenes at a boarding school for magical elites: secret relationships and mean girls, not to mention the prophecy of the Chosen One. As Ivy hunts for answers to Sylvia Capley's gruesome death, details about her childhood and bias against magic emerge, and she finds out just how much the past can affect the present.