Credit: Rob Boyce

As wealthy Londoners await the grand opening of the Great Exhibition of 1851 in the new Crystal Palace, Zaria Mendoza is at her work table in the city’s slums completing one of her late father’s dark-market commissions. The 18-year-old, like her father, is an alchemologist – she creates magic-powered weapons, albeit for a meagre sum. She and her best friend, Jules Zhao, want out of Devil’s Acre, out of London, but she needs to finish the commissions to get the money, if her life-draining work or her clients don’t kill her first.

At the same time, con man Kane Durante and his best friend, Fletcher Collins, work for Alexander Ward, the kingpin of London’s underworld. Kane knows Alexander will never let him go, but he makes a deal to steal a special jewelled necklace from the Great Exhibition in exchange for Fletcher’s freedom. To pull off a theft in a crowd of thousands, Kane needs a whole lot of magic and promises Zaria the other jewels in the exhibit case in exchange for her help.

Both Zaria and Kane pretend to trust each other. Both have plans to betray each other.

Told in alternating chapters, To Steal from Thieves is the first in a new young adult fantasy series. The story is a very slow build as readers meet Zaria and Kane, learn about their lots in life, and ponder their developing love-hate relationship. The love part of that relationship feels unnecessary and distracting. Also distracting is the modern-day dialogue in the Victorian England setting. The two leads – and the writing – are far more interesting and believable when the story is focused on their individual struggles and the high-stakes heist.

The vivid, juxtaposing descriptions of the Devil’s Acre slum and the Great Exhibition are eye-opening. Devil’s Acre was known for its alarming childhood deaths, absolute squalor, and extreme poverty. Charles Dickens described it as “the blackest tide of moral turpitude.” In contrast, more than 14,000 exhibitors at the Crystal Palace displayed art, inventions, and “works of industry,” from giant diamonds to a canoe from Canada.

The heist is the highlight of the book, the moment when (almost) everything moves at rocket speed and Zaria’s magical prowess is revealed. Readers will hold their breath wondering just how this will end. It likely won’t end as they imagine – but it does deliver a spot-on cliffhanger for the second book of the series.