Eleven-year-old Alex Bennett is used to being overlooked by his classmates. From being bullied due to his OCD, he’s learned that being invisible is the safest option. So he’s unprepared when the new girl, Ida May, requests to partner with him on a school project. And he is even more unprepared when the project she wants to work on reveals a mysterious message left on a cassette tape—one that leads the pair to a box buried in Alex’s front yard.

Soon, Alex finds himself knee-deep in a mystery he wanted no part of. Urged on by his therapist and Ida May, he’s forced to step out of his carefully created comfort zone to untangle the complicated history he and Ida May have uncovered. But the more time Alex spends with Ida May, the more he wonders if the friendship growing between them is real or if she’ll leave as soon as the mystery is solved. As he and Ida May close in on the answers they’ve been searching for, Alex begins to understand that not everything is as it seems on the surface, and that maybe he doesn’t have to hide his OCD—or himself—from the world.

Written by a lifelong educator, The Cassette Tape Secret addresses sensitive subjects with a light touch as middle-grade readers solve a mystery alongside characters who are finding their place in a world that might not easily understand them.