Seventeen-year-old Phoebe was never interested in her birth family. But on the cusp of her high school graduation, her adoptive mother, Greta, insists on a visit to meet her biological parents and siblings. The encounter is a jolt, a revelation that derails Phoebe. With the help of her best friend, Luna, Phoebe runs away --- as far as their friend Patrick O’Connor’s chaotic home, where she hopes to go unnoticed among his 13 siblings. But when Phoebe asks Patrick to chop off her hip-length hair, she’s suddenly transformed. Patrick’s older brothers can’t help but notice the striking, Peter Pan–like stranger who suddenly has appeared in their midst. What starts as an adolescent rebellion soon spirals into a whirlwind of self-discovery and unexpected connections.

Mary Frances "Frankie" Lombard is fiercely in love with her family's sprawling apple orchard and the tangled web of family members who inhabit it. But she cannot help being haunted by the historical fact that some family members end up staying on the farm and others must leave. Change is inevitable, and threats of urbanization, disinheritance and college applications shake the foundation of Frankie's roots. As Frankie is forced to shed her childhood fantasies and face the possibility of losing the idyllic future she had envisioned for her family, she must decide whether loving something means clinging tightly or letting go.