Seventeen-year-old Quinn has heard all her life about how untrustworthy men are, so when she discovers that her charismatic but selfish father, with whom she has recently begun to have a tentative relationship, has stolen from the many women in his life, she decides she must avenge this wrong.

In Washington State, seventeen-year-old Cassie learns about the good and bad sides of both love and genius while living with her mother and brilliant, yet disturbed, violinist stepfather and falling in love with a gifted young musician.

High school junior Jordan MacKenzie's life was pretty typical: fractured family, new boyfriend, and a dead-end job. She'd been living with her father, the predictable optometrist, since her mother, the hippie holdover, had become too embarrassing to be around and Jordan finally felt that her life was normal. That is, until she met Gayle D'Angelo, her father's girlfriend.