Many consider the years between thirteen and twenty to be crucial ones in the final development of an individual's personality. If so, then seventeen must be regarded as the focal point, the watershed year. For it is then that a person makes the first real decision affecting his or her own future.

This is the situation Ross Hunter finds himself in. Two things are uppermost in his mind — getting away from home and the well-intentioned plans of his father to send him to pharmacy school, and shedding his unwanted virginity and passing over into full manhood. But Ross' dreams take on a nightmarish quality as he finds his first steps into the world of sex carry with them a terrible taboo, an implication of shame and perversity that he finds himself helplessly drawn into.

Where, indeed, will it all lead for Ross? Will he be able to untangle his life and cross over into adulthood with some hope of becoming a relatively happy individual? A novel of compelling interest to America, where growing up today seems a task with more pitfalls than ever before in our history.

The Publisher

When I glanced up into the rear-view mirror, I could see Jim already had his hand inside Teeny's blouse and was fondling one of her firm tits feverishly. It just made my aching cock get that much stiffer and I thought for sure my hard-on was going to split my pants if I didn't get some relief soon. I looked over at the girl sitting coyly at my side, and shifted closer to her, my eyes riveted to her big boobs. Trying to appear nonchalant, I put one arm around her plump shoulders and hugged her close, letting my other hand creep stealthily up between us and fumble with a blouse button.