EDGEWATER

Grey Gardens meets teen family drama.

Lorrie Hollander is used to a trust fund that never runs dry and summers at an exclusive horse camp, but everything changes when Lorrie is discharged from camp after her guardian, her erratic aunt, Gigi, neglects to pay the tuition. Crestfallen, Lorrie heads home to Edgewater, the Hollander family estate, once an impressive and elegant home but now fallen to ruin of health-risk proportions and a constant source of shame for Lorrie. When Lorrie confronts her aunt about the missed payment, Gigi, who doesn’t care for life’s minutiae (like paying the electric bill), tells her she moved the money; its whereabouts are none of Lorrie’s concern. However, Lorrie is used to assuming adult responsibility in the absence of competent adult care, and she takes it upon herself to locate the trust fund. Her search reveals family secrets that go much deeper and farther back than the missing money. At times, Lorrie seems more concerned with her budding romance with Charlie, the local senator’s heartthrob son, than locating the money (and being able to pay the bills), but she’s still a teenager, after all. Astute readers will realize what's going on before Lorrie does, but the how and the why are so intriguing they’ll read until way past bedtime.

Riveting and heartbreaking.