Brief

A young girl is thrust into a world of money and excess after her parents divorce and finds herself growing close to the two most popular guys in town.

What We Liked

- Young, sexy cast;
- Appealing and relatable to a young audience, even when over the top;
- As a self-contained film, this story would work well as each scene would build the tension and drama the lead character experiences within each of her interactions;
- It all takes place in one town, almost a character on its own;
- Final act that rewards the audience for following along.

Synopsis

Samantha Strattan has become used to playing sober driver for her two best friends, Lydia and Jessica, as they hop from party to party, looking to see and be seen. Only Sam doesn’t really care about that. But when she gets home from a party one night to find her mother packing up all her things, telling Sam she’s leaving her father and they’re moving in with her new lover, her life turns upside down. Suddenly Sam has a reason to care what people think about her family life, especially since her mother announces her new beau is the rich father of Mason and Logan Kade, two of the coolest boys in town. Most girls would be thrilled at the idea of moving into the Kade Mansion, but not Sam - she’s doing all she can to stay sane, expounded by a mother who seems to only look out for her own interests and a father who actually turns out to not be her biological dad.

Drama keeps coming into Sam’s life. She finds out her boyfriend cheated on her with one of her best friends, while her other best friend knew about it for two years. Her mother wants to keep the man she knew to be her father away from her and worse still, Sam’s mother has never told her real father about her. Sam lashes out - she physically fights with her mother, torches her non-biological father’s car and goes running for hours on end. In the Kade brothers, she finds unexpected allies. When she sees them torch a car belonging to a rival school’s football team member and keeps quiet about it, she earns their trust — and their protection. They make sure she’s not bothered at school and they keep Sam’s mother off her back, even going so far as to force a bottle of alcohol down her throat just to keep her quiet when she starts drunkenly shouting at Sam one night. In the meantime, Sam still has to deal with being the centre of gossip at her school. One of the football stars, Adam wants to date her, but Sam’s new friend, the sweet and adorable Becky has had a lifelong crush on him. That doesn’t matter anyway, because Sam isn’t really interested in Adam. She’s developed feelings for Mason, her would-be brother. Realizing that would really give people something to talk about, Sam tries to suppress her feelings. But the more she does, the more they grow.

Sam and Mason give in to their feelings and start sleeping together. They think they’re doing a good job of hiding their relationship, but it turns out, they’re not. Sam’s real father, Garrett, comes into town — he is actually sleeping with Mason’s mother. Garrett feels like taking out his anger on not knowing he had a daughter on both Sam’s family and Mason’s. So he calls everyone together one night to his hotel room, where Sam’s mother and Mason’s father find out their children are sleeping together. The secret’s out - and soon everyone at school knows too. It seems Sam may have been through a lot, but she’s still the same person she always was - someone who never gave a damn what others think. She and Mason continue their relationship, setting up the scene for a possible next installment of their crazy teenage lives.

About The Author

Tijan is a New York Times Bestselling author of the Carter Reed Series, the Fallen Crest Series, and the Broken and Screwed Series, among others. She lives in north Minnesota.