Hand, Elizabeth, Cass Neary novels

Cass Neary needs cash to get home to New York, and she's already sold her camera-like losing a limb, for a photographer of her experience. Her best chance is to get in on the deal that Griffin, an old flame, is about to cut with a notoriously particular bookseller for a gorgeous, ancient illuminated manuscript: The Book of Lamps and Banners. This Book is more than just a beautiful object-its text and images are said to have a powerful magic capable of life-changing effects on anyone who reads it. But before the sale can be completed, an intruder brazenly steals the Book out from under the dealer's nose. Cass and Griff are the only suspects. To clear their names, and keep the missing text out of dangerous hands, Cass plunges into a curious underworld at the intersection of antiquarian books, cutting-edge software, and modern nationalist politics