Seventeen-year-old Waverly Lyons is from Vermont; she doesn't do sun. But after her divorced parents can't agree on who gets to have her for the summer, Waverly gets shipped off to Holden, Florida to spend a couple months with her aunt, Rachel. Her hopes for the perfect summer seem crushed. Then she meets Blake Hamilton, Rachel's seventeen-year-old neighbor. He's athletic, outgoing, arrogant, tan, and pretty much Waverly's exact opposite. She's eager to avoid him at all costs, hoping to fit in with the other kids in Holden without drawing too much attention to herself. But when Blake discovers that Waverly has been hiding the rather embarrassing secret that she can't swim, he does the unthinkable: he offers to teach her.
