The Astral Traveler’s Daughter (A School for Psychics #2)

Showing some signs of maturity, this teen-friendly urban fantasy brings back ex-cardsharp Teddy Cannon (introduced in A School for Psychics) to search for her birth mother, Marysue, suspected terrorist and astral traveler. Teddy, a second-year student at Whitfield Institute, pushes her fellow students further into the plot of Derek Yates, escaped fugitive psychic, to find evidence that will exonerate her mother and free her from a secretive psychic cabal. But Teddy’s friends have their own issues, including finding a missing classmate and stopping a plan to use an experimental drug that removes or adds psychic abilities. Matters come to a head with an attempted bombing and a kidnapping that trigger Teddy’s power to time travel and change the past. Archer plays fair, laying out clues so that a savvy reader will realize the identity of the cabal’s hidden mastermind probably before the heroes do. The frenetic, supernatural detective work will likely provide a nostalgic glow, though, for readers hoping to hear foiled villains mutter about getting away with it if not for those meddling kids. Agent: Amelia Atlas, ICM Partners. (Apr.)