BOOK OF ESSIE Megan Maclean Weir & YONAHLOSEE RIDING SCHOOL FOR GIRLS paperback

The Book of Essie- Meghan Mclean Weir- Esther "Essie" Anne Hicks becomes pregnant shortly before turning 17, which is problematic as she is the daughter of a charismatic pastor. The pastor and his family are the subject of a reality television show "Six for Hicks"—Essie has thus spent much of her life in the public eye. Essie's mother Celia decides that the best solution for the pregnancy so as not to harm their reputation would be for Essie to get married immediately. Though she does not have a boyfriend, Essie subtly influences her mother to suggest she marry Roarke Richards, a fellow teenager whose family is experiencing financial difficulties, yet who has aspirations to attend Columbia University. It is 1930, the midst of the Great Depression. After her mysterious role in a family tragedy, passionate, strong-willed Thea Atwell, age fifteen, has been cast out of her Florida home, exiled to an equestrienne boarding school for Southern debutantes. High in the Blue Ridge Mountains, with its complex social strata ordered by money, beauty, and girls’ friendships, the Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls is a far remove from the free-roaming, dreamlike childhood Thea shared with her twin brother on their family’s citrus farm—a world now partially shattered. As Thea grapples with her responsibility for the events of the past year that led her here, she finds herself enmeshed in a new order, one that will change her sense of what is possible for herself, her family, her country