The Vanishing Stair by Maureen Johnson

This is the second book in the Truly Devious series, and I blew through it just as quickly as I did the first one. Stevie is continuing her investigation of the Ellingham murders, but another student has disappeared and she has to figure out what happened to her as well. It all sounds so mysterious, and almost too coincidental, when you describe it that way, but when you read the story, it all makes total sense and works great. I was surprised at the end of the first book that there were no answers to the mystery in that one, that this book just continued Stevie's investigation, but I loved all of her discoveries and all the information you get from the author as you go. Johnson does an amazing job of dropping little pieces of data and documents from the past into her story, to give you, as the reader, more and more puzzle pieces as you figure things out along with Stevie. My main complaints about this book were minor--I still hated her love interest, and didn't get why she felt any responsibility or interest in him at all, and I really didn't like how she referred to one of the characters as "them." I feel like so many YA novels have to have a gay best friend (see Tweet Cute as well), which is great, but this is the first one I've seen with a character that is non-binary and uses a "them" pronoun, which is TERRIBLE to read. This character "wrapped themselves around" someone else, and "locked their eyes" on something, and I was so confused every time I read it and it took so long to make sense of what was being written. I understand wanting to be diverse, but I hate reading things that are so imprecise and difficult to read. I am not a fan of that grammatical change at all. So yes, a very minor quibble, but one that definitely stuck with me.