A teenage boy goes to spend a summer with his paternal grandmother and girl cousins -- whom he doesn't know very well -- as his father died years earlier in a car accident. What he discovers, by inhabiting his father's boyhood bedroom, is a fantasy spy story his father wrote -- and unfortunately lived. It emerges that his father had had a paranoid schizophrenic period in his youth. ( )

When Kip's mom goes on her honeymoon to Hawaii, he is forced to spend a month with his grandmother and five girl cousins. Because the house is about to be torn down, the kdis are able to write on the walls and demolish anything not structurally necessary. Kip is not used to being around a spirited group of girls, and so he spends a lot of time in his attic bedroom where he discovers a notebook his dead father had kept as a teen. There are a number of ways Kip feels he is the "odd man out," but this summer will change that and his life forever. ( )

Kip is off to stay with his grandmother and a whole host of girl cousins while his mom and new stepfather go on their honeymoon. Unhappy at the thought of losing his mom and in a place where he has never been before, Kip is a little unsettled until he finds a special notebook belonging to his dad. Between reading it, building a yurt, and having quite a bit of fun with his cousins, Kip learns about his past, his present, and what the future might hold for him.