“March McQuin didn’t think he’d ever be in this position again — upside down and dangling twenty feet over a store floor at three o’clock in the morning.”

From Jude Watson’s Sting.

Finally back together after being kept apart because of a curse, twins March and Jules have picked up where their criminal parents left off.  Raised by their cat burgled father, March has pulled all kinds of jobs all over the world, while Jules’ time as a street performer has made her a natural asset.  Working with fellow orphans Darius and Izzy, the group of young thieves has decided to pull off their first heist in a year.  When they go to pull off a diamond heist in Paris, the group’s plans fall thorough when someone else breaks in at the same time they do, so March and Jules are only able to get away with one large sapphire called the Morning Star.  When his fence, Hamish, finds out some information on the stone they have, he asks them to find and steal the other two sapphires that made up a famous necklace to sell as a set for millions, but March and the others decline.  However, when March and his friends return home to New York to find that their fortune has been stolen and their home sold, Hamish then offers the sapphire heists as a way to buy back their home and fortune.  The kids decide to go for the other sapphires, but an argument between March and Darius only adds to the deadly competition that they face from a famous European group of jewel thieves all combines to make these heists the most dangerous of their young lives.

This sequel to Watson’s Loot, this book picks up right where the first book left off. The young criminals are smart and endearing, especially when paired with the book’s thrilling mystery. With solid (slightly-criminal) heroes and cunning villains, Sting is a must-read for fans of fast-paced crime mysteries.