The Ruby in the Smoke- Philip Pullman

‘She was a person of sixteen or so- alone, and uncommonly pretty. She was slender and pale, and dressed in mourning, with a black bonnet under which she tucked back a stray twist of blonde hair that the wind had teased loose. She had usually dark eyes for one so fair. Her name was Sally Lockhart; and within fifteen minutes, she was going to kill a man.’

Pullman does it again. Probably the best opening of a book every, this is the first in his less well know trilogy. Set in Victorian London it is a quintessentially an adventure story with a kick ass female protagonist and a great historical background.