So Gramp’s "time machine" actually works! Fourteen-year-old Susan Ferguson is startled when she’s catapulted into the wild streets of 1872 Manhattan—where danger and adventure await at every turn. 

The errand she volunteered for is scary enough—to bring home a brain that holds the key to her grandfather’s survival—but her mission quickly spirals into chaos when she has to navigate a perilous landscape filled with street gangs, narrow escapes, and diseases from a bygone age.

Susan has always been an instinctive liar, but now she’s playing in the big leagues. She’s mistaken for a boy, but goes along with it for safety. To conceal her spooky time travel she tells people she’s a visitor from Australia. As an Australian boy she gets temporary shelter from a normal family, then becomes an assistant to the surgeon who removed the brain.

Susan must escape murderous bullies and dodge a suspicious detective while tumbling into a historic blackmail case. Her only ally is a street-smart newsboy who sometimes helps her with a mixture of bravado, misinformation, and genuine skills. Could they become a team?