JUNIORS

Kaui Hart Hemmings gets at the heart of what it means to belong in this profoundly sensitive and authentic coming?of?age story.

Lea Lane has lived in between all her life. Part Hawaiian, part Mainlander. Perpetual new girl at school. Hanging at the edge of her actress mother’s spotlight. And now: newest resident of the mythically wealthy West family’s housekeeper’s cottage. Bracing herself for the embarrassment of being her classmates’ latest charity case, Lea is surprised to find herself becoming actual friends with the two West kids—or in the case of gorgeous, unattainable Will West, possibly even more than friends. And despite their differences, Whitney West and Lea have a lot in common: both are navigating a tangled web of relationships, past disappointments, and future hopes. As things heat up with Will, and her friendship with Whitney deepens, Lea has to decide how much she’s willing to compromise in order to fit into their world: the closeness she shares with her mother, her childhood friend Danny, even how she sees herself. It’s not until those pieces of her life start to fall apart that she realizes the only real way to belong is to define herself on her own terms. Kaui Hart Hemmings is the author of the story collection House of Thieves and the novels The Possibilities and The Descendants, her first novel, which has been published in twenty?one countries and is now an Oscar?winning film directed by Alexander Payne and starring George Clooney. She has degrees from Colorado College and Sarah Lawrence and was a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. A one?time resident of Breckenridge, Colorado, she now lives in Hawaii.