The Starlight Secret Society: An Atherton Manor Mystery (The Atherton Manor Mysteries Book 1)

A globe. A sundial. A maze of mirrors. An echoing grotto. The Athertons have a story their mother once told them — and a chain of clues that has been waiting for them all along.

Atherton Manor sits at the end of a long drive, its west wing closed off, its grounds vast and partly overgrown. Eleven-year-old Leo, ten-year-old Clara, and eight-year-old Finn have lived there all their lives. Their mother has been unwell for two years and rarely leaves the second-floor sitting room. Their father carries the household quietly. Mrs. Penberthy, the housekeeper, observes everything and explains almost nothing.

Three years ago, on a rainy afternoon, their mother told them a family story about a stone called the Sunstone — a stone the size of a hen’s egg, hidden by an Atherton ancestor at the top of the highest hill. It does not give brilliance. It reveals the brilliance one already has.

Then they find the first clue.

A globe in the library yields a parchment map. The conservatory sundial reveals a serpent stone. Hidden mechanisms open. A wooden teardrop. A wooden bird. A walk across the south park to the half-mile-distant aviary. A brass cylinder engraved WHERE LIGHT IS NOT WHAT IT SEEMS. A maze of mirrors in the west wing ballroom. A hedge garden labyrinth built over seven summers by a great-aunt who was disinherited from the family. An echoing grotto with an acoustic puzzle. A storm at the folly tower. An observatory at the summit of the eastern hill, with a celestial alignment that requires every artifact they have collected.

And, threading through all of it, a rival group of children with their own reasons for finding the Sunstone first — and a man named Mr. Pemberton who is paying them to do it.

For readers of The Mysterious Benedict Society, The Penderwicks, The Secret Garden, and Frances Hardinge. A quiet, literary middle-grade adventure about three siblings who discover that the path their mother once described — carved through a hundred years of Atherton history — was waiting all along for someone willing to walk it.

Above the manor, the stars come out. The first meeting of the Atherton Discovery Society begins at the end.

Book 1 of The Atherton Manor Mysteries. A portion of every sale is donated to the Kids Future Fund.