Here, Barbara Lehman takes readers on a timeless trip to a world of secret messages left in secret boxes hidden in secret places.

The Secret Box is a Junior Library Guild selection and the first in an irresistible middle grade series that will delight fans of Dan Gutman, Wendy Mass, and Trenton Lee Stewart. What starts as a fun quest to open a mysterious birthday present quickly turns crazy and dangerous when Jax and her cousin Ethan discover themselves at the center of a special magical legacy. Soon they realize the secret box was not intended as a gift, but as call for help that they alone can answer. Readers will love the page-turning mystery, hilarious girl and boy narrators, and clever incorporation of mythology—and lingering questions will leave them eager for more.

The tale begins over three-hundred years ago, when the Fair People—the goblins, fairies, dragons, and other fabled and fantastic creatures of a dozen lands—fled the Old World for the New, seeking haven from the ways of Man. With them came their precious jewels: diamonds, rubies, emeralds, pearls... But then the Fair People vanished, taking with them their twelve fabulous treasures. And they remained hidden until now... Across North America, these twelve treasures, over ten-thousand dollars in precious jewels, are buried. The key to finding each can be found within the twelve full color paintings and verses of The Secret. Yet The Secret is much more than that. At long last, you can learn not only the whereabouts of the Fair People's treasure, but also the modern forms and hiding places of their descendants: the Toll Trolls, Maitre D'eamons, Elf Alphas, Tupperwerewolves, Freudian Sylphs, Culture Vultures, West Ghosts and other delightful creatures in the world around us. The Secret is a field guide to them all. Many "armchair treasure hunt" books have been published over the years, most notably Masquerade (1979) by British artist Kit Williams. Masquerade promised a jewel-encrusted golden hare to the first person to unravel the riddle that Williams cleverly hid in his art. In 1982, while everyone in Britain was still madly digging up hedgerows and pastures in search of the golden hare, The Secret: A Treasure Hunt was published in America. The previous year, author and publisher Byron Preiss had traveled to 12 locations in the continental U.S. (and possibly Canada) to secretly bury a dozen ceramic casques. Each casque contained a small key that could be redeemed for one of 12 jewels Preiss kept in a safe deposit box in New York. The key to finding the casques was to match one of 12 paintings to one of 12 poetic verses, solve the resulting riddle, and start digging. Since 1982, only two of the 12 casques have been recovered. The first was located in Grant Park, Chicago, in 1984 by a group of students. The second was unearthed in 2004 in Cleveland by two members of the Quest4Treasure forum. Preiss was killed in an auto accident in the summer of 2005, but the hunt for his casques continues.

Elizabeth Agustin, a pretty and smart Filipina, has a privileged life as the favourite daughter of a highly respected politician. However, her father is inconsiderate of her desires to pursue art and instead wants her to become a lawyer and eventually succeed him as mayor of their city. She rebels against him and runs away from home, nearly destroying her life. She is finally awakened to her senses, and burying the events of her rebellion in the past, she goes to the US to study and work. She comes back to live in the Philippines when her father dies. Then through her work, she meets Rolando Mendoza, a successful and brilliant CEO. Rolando falls in love with her, but he cannot legally marry her. Though he has been separated from his wife for years, she refuses to grant him a divorce. Elizabeth's conservative upbringing makes her reject Rolando's advances, but she can't deny her growing love for him. In addition, she's keeping a secret from Rolando that could change everything.

Happy in her new foster home where she has found Jesus as her Savior, Libby is troubled when her father, whom she doesn't remember, sends her gifts for her 12th birthday.

The Secret Cipher is the sequel to The Secret Box, a rollicking adventure full of family rivalry, magic, questing, and laugh-out-loud humor that's perfect for fans of Dan Gutman, Wendy Mass, and Trenton Lee Stewart. Jax Malone and her cousin Ethan Hoche were not expecting one of Jax's birthday presents to contain a dangerous magical object from a mythical past: an urn with the dark power to suck hope out of the world. Though the first urn is safely hidden, there are two more urns that could rid humanity of both faith and love. And powerful enemies who want to find them and use them to control the world. Now, even though they were never meant to open the present and discover its secret, Jax and Ethan must race to find and destroy the two remaining urns before it's too late.

The Code Busters are excited for their class field trip to Angel Island, known as the Ellis Island of the West. One of Mika's ancestors passed through the island's immigration station in the early twentieth century, and Mika thinks he may have left behind some secret messages . . . plus a very special box. But as the Code Busters search for hints from the past, they get caught up in an even bigger secret. Can you crack the code? Test your brain with the Code Busters to see if you have the right stuff to be an ace detective. Answers are in the back, in case you get stuck.