From the International bestselling author of Steeplejack and Sekret Machines comes an amazing fantasy adventure with tons of magic, mirth, and mayhem!

It’s Will Hawthorne’s birthday. His 18th birthday, as a matter of fact. Today is the day he gets to do what he’s always dreamed of – act.

Well, he’s been acting. But now that he’s an adult, he might get to play a male role for a change. Even better, now he has the opportunity to write plays for his acting company and make the worlds of his imagination come alive and become real.

But the real world is stranger and more magical than he ever imagined.

Suddenly, Will finds himself on the run from the Empire, embroiled in death-defying escapades with a troupe of roving adventurers, and battling…magicians?!? Will doesn’t believe in magic, but it believes in him, and that’s more than enough to make his life far more interesting than he’d ever hoped for.

Can the snarky actor learn to put other before himself?

Will the boy truly become a man?

Is there even a chance his quick wit and smart mouth can get Will out of this mess? 

“Fast paced and beautifully written” — R.A. Salvatore

“I was amazed by these vividly knowledgeable adventures of a youth living by his wits in a world much like Elizabethan England.” — David Drake

“Adventure meets a hero who just won’t shut up in this fast-talking charmer of a novel” — Kate Elliott

“Hartley’s prose is so graceful, his narrative so taut and his battle-scenes so exciting and well-described… This is especially true of the compulsively readable second half which unfolds with remarkable grace and power.” — Booklist

A “clever page-turner” — Publishers Weekly (Starred review)