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Special guests Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin join Tea, Tonic & Toxin to discuss their book The Bletchley Riddle.

Remember, you are bound by the Official Secrets Act…

Summer, 1940. Nineteen-year-old Jakob Novis and his quirky younger sister, Lizzie, share a love of riddles and puzzles. And now they’re living inside of one. The quarrelsome siblings find themselves amid one of the greatest secrets of World War II—Britain’s eccentric codebreaking factory at Bletchley Park. As Jakob joins Bletchley’s top minds to crack the Nazi’s Enigma cipher, fourteen-year-old Lizzie embarks on a mission to solve the mysterious disappearance of their mother.

The Battle of Britain rages and Hitler’s invasion creeps closer. And at the same time, baffling messages and codes arrive on their doorstep while a menacing inspector lurks outside the gates of the Bletchley mansion. Are the messages truly for them, or are they a trap? Could the riddles of Enigma and their mother’s disappearance be somehow connected? Jakob and Lizzie must find a way to work together as they race to decipher clues that unravel a shocking puzzle that presents the ultimate challenge: How long must a secret be kept?

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Ruta Sepetys (Rūta Šepetys) is an internationally acclaimed, #1 New York Times bestselling author of historical fiction published in over sixty countries and forty languages. Considered a “crossover” novelist, her books are read by both students and adults worldwide. Winner of the Carnegie Medal and honored by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Ruta is renowned for giving voice to underrepresented history and those who experienced it. Her books have won or been shortlisted for more than fifty book prizes, appear on over forty state reading lists, and are currently in development for film and television.

A former textbook writer, Steve Sheinkin is now making amends by writing books young people might actually want to read.

He’s the author of fast-paced, cinematic, nonfiction page-turners, including Bomb, Fallout, Undefeated, Born to Fly, The Port Chicago 50, and Impossible Escape.

He is also the author of The Bletchley Riddle, a middle grade novel written with Ruta Sepetys. The historical mystery is set in Bletchley Park, Britain’s top secret codebreaking factory during World War II.

Steve’s many accolades include a Newbery Honor, three Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards, a Sibert Medal and Honor, three National Book Award finalist honors, and the Margaret A. Edwards Award. He lives with his family in Saratoga Springs, New York.

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