by Deb Caletti
First published 2006
Jordan MacKenzie has crafted what feels like a normal teenage life in her small town. The high school junior lives with her father Vince, a steady optometrist who seems refreshingly predictable compared to her embarrassing hippie mother. Jordan has a new boyfriend, a job that pays the bills, and the usual family complications. She knows her father is seeing Gayle D'Angelo, and she knows Gayle has a husband. Jordan figures this is just another messy adult situation she can ignore. Then the affair between Vince and Gayle explodes into violence that shatters everything Jordan thought she understood about her quiet father and their small community. The illicit relationship destroys lives in ways no one could have predicted. Jordan must confront the reality that the people closest to us can harbor secrets that change everything we believed about them and ourselves.
Genres: fiction, mystery, contemporary, family-drama
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: deception, secrets
Setting: Small Town
372 pages · Paperback · Scholastic Ltd
Content warnings: domestic-violence, violence