# Read the first page of The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes Read the opening of The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes free, no signup. A poor teen inherits billions from a stranger's puzzle-filled will. - Page: https://uncovered.ink/read/the-inheritance-games-jennifer-lynn-barnes - Genre: Ya mystery - Year: 2020 - ISBN: 9781368053242 - Read it blind (cover and title hidden): https://uncovered.ink/?b=9781368053242&s=read-page - Buy: https://bookshop.org/a/125786/9781368053242 - Borrow: https://search.worldcat.org/search?q=9781368053242 ## The opening When I was a kid, my mom constantly invented games. The Quiet Game. The Who Can Make Their Cookie Last Longer? Game. A perennial favorite, The Marshmallow Game involved eating marshmallows while wearing puffy Goodwill jackets indoors, to avoid turning on the heat. The Flashlight Game was what we played when the electricity went out. We never walked anywhere—we raced. The floor was nearly always lava. The primary purpose of pillows was building forts. Our longest-lasting game was called I Have A Secret, because my mom said that everyone should always have at least one. Some days she guessed mine. Some days she didn’t. We played every week, right up until I was fifteen and one of her secrets landed her in the hospital. The next thing I knew, she was gone. “Your move, princess.” A gravelly voice dragged me back to the present. “I don’t have all day.” “Not a princess,” I retorted, sliding one of my knights into place. “Your move, old man.” Harry scowled at me. I didn’t know how old he was, really, and I had no idea how he’d come to be homeless and living in the park where we played chess each morning. I did know that he was a formidable opponent. “You,” he grumbled, eyeing the board, “are a horrible person.” Three moves later, I had him. “Checkmate. You know what that means, Harry.” He gave me a dirty look. “I have to let you buy me breakfast.” Those were the terms of our long-standing bet. When I won, he couldn’t turn down the free meal. To my credit, I only gloated a little. “It’s good to be queen.” Explore book giveaways, sneak peeks, deals, and more. Tap here to learn more. I made it to school on time but barely. I had a habit of cutting things close. I walked the same tightrope with my grades: How little effort could I put in and still get an A? I wasn’t lazy. I was practical. Picking up an extra shift was worth trading a 98 for a 92. I was in the middle of drafting an English paper in Spanish class when I was called to the office. Girls like me were supposed to be invisible. We didn’t get summoned for sit-downs with the principal. We made exactly as much trouble as we could afford to make, which in my case was none. “Avery.” Principal Altman’s greeting was not what one would call warm. “Have a seat.” I sat. He folded his hands on the desk between us. “I assume you know why you’re here.” Unless this was about the weekly poker game I’d been running in the parking lot to finance Harry’s breakfasts—and sometimes my own—I had no idea what I’d done to draw the administration’s attention. “Sorry,” I said, trying to sound sufficiently meek, “but I don’t.” Principal Altman let me sit with my response for a moment, then presented me with a stapled packet of paper. “This is the physics test you took yesterday.” “Okay,” I said. That wasn’t the response he was looking for, but it was all I had. For once, I’d actually studied. I couldn’t imagine I’d done badly enough to merit intervention. “Mr. Yates graded the tests, Avery. Yours was the only perfect score.” “Great,” I said, in a deliberate effort to keep myself from saying okay again. “Not great, young lady. Mr. Yates intentionally creates exams that challenge the abilities of his students. In twenty years, he’s never given a perfect score. Do you see the problem?” ## Books with a similar feel - [A Good Girl's Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson](https://uncovered.ink/read/a-good-girls-guide-to-murder-holly-jackson.md) - [The Cousins by Karen M. McManus](https://uncovered.ink/read/the-cousins-karen-m-mcmanus.md) - [Invisible Girl by Lisa Jewell](https://uncovered.ink/read/invisible-girl-lisa-jewell.md) - [Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q. Sutanto](https://uncovered.ink/read/dial-a-for-aunties-jesse-q-sutanto.md) - [Never Never by Colleen Hoover](https://uncovered.ink/read/never-never-colleen-hoover.md) - [Billion Dollar Whale by Bradley Hope & Tom Wright](https://uncovered.ink/read/billion-dollar-whale-bradley-hope-and-tom-wright.md) --- Source: Uncovered (https://uncovered.ink). A short sample shown for reading and discovery. Rights holders can request removal at https://uncovered.ink/takedown.