Part of Truly Devious
First published 2026
Stevie Bell arrives in New York City nursing a broken heart. Her boyfriend David has been sending mixed signals and kissing other girls in London pubs. She needs something to focus on besides her messy romantic life. A corpse in a Manhattan apartment building provides the perfect distraction. Stevie has always preferred investigating dead people to understanding living ones. Dead bodies don't text cryptically or betray you with other people. But this murder case proves more tangled than expected. As Stevie digs deeper into the victim's connections, she starts questioning whether she can trust anyone at all. The investigation forces her to examine human relationships and wonder if attraction is just another form of manipulation. She begins to see how people can slip into dangerous group dynamics without realizing it. While solving the crime, Stevie must also decide if her relationship with David can survive their current problems or if she should accept that it's truly finished.
Genres: fiction, romance, coming-of-age, mystery, contemporary, young-adult
Vibes: character-driven, emotional, fast-paced, introspective, suspenseful
Tropes: amateur-detective, emotional-growth, second-chance-romance, slow-burn
Setting: New York City, Manhattan, London
Period: 21st-century, contemporary
400 pages · Hardcover · HarperCollins
Content warnings: death, murder