This was not your typical YA novel.

Poppy is not your typical teenager. She's a senior but she's never attended any one school for more than a few months at a time. Sometimes she hasn't attended school. She is smart, but she's also smart enough to know not to get close to everyone. Because one day her parents will tell her, we have to go. Now. She might have time to pack one suitcase. She might not. But next thing she knows, they've relocated across the country and have new identities. And this isn't official--like it's obviously not a part of Witness Protection. It's more underground. Shady. Like maybe, it's wrong. Like someone is looking for her parents. (By the way, DO NOT read the description as the part where it tells you which historical figure this is partly based on, gives a lot away.)

But Poppy is turning 18. And this latest move to California seems different. Her mom is depressed. And also seems to have some connection to the house they're living in--she's obviously familiar with it and has been there before. This summer, Poppy enrolls in an accelerated match class and the professor teaching it is very impressed. She asks where Poppy's going to college. But Poppy can't go to college. And she can't tell anyone why. She doesn't have a social security number. Or a birth certificate. She doesn't know her parents' real names. And her parents, well they seem to have not thought through what would happen to their daughters when they grow up. There's no good solution so I understand postponing it, but do they really expect Poppy to live with them and be dependent on them forever? Like into her twenties and thirties? But if Poppy wants to have a real life--to go to college and have a job and be on the grid, she can't ever see her family again.

The decisions and ethical dilemmas in this book are unique and unusual. The trust between Poppy and her parents is very strong--until it isn't. She hasn't gone through the typical teenage rebellious stage, because she just can't. That would be too risky. But it doesn't mean she's not a teenager and she isn't struggling against the strictures that govern her life.

A fascinating and different novel. It really covers a lot of ground that makes you ponder what you would do, and if there is any way out, for things to turn out okay for everyone. This book really made me think.

This book is published by Flatiron Books, a division of Macmillan, my employer.

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