Swim Season

Teens

synopsis

Synopsis

Swim Season is the fast-paced, drama driven story of Olympic hopeful Aerin Keane, starting senior year in her third high school and trying NOT to win. But can she hide her natural talent and competitive streak? Especially with a 50,000-dollar scholarship on the line?

bio

Author Biography

Marianne Sciucco is not a nurse who writes but a writer who happens to be a nurse. A lover of words and books, she dreamt of becoming an author when she grew up but became a nurse to avoid poverty. She later brought her two passions together and writes about the intricate lives of people struggling with health and family issues. Her debut novel Blue Hydrangeas, an Alzheimer’s love story, is a Kindle bestseller; IndieReader Approved; a BookWorks featured book; and a Library Journal Self-e Selection. Her years of experience caring for dementia patients inspired this book and led her to become a cofounder and manager of AlzAuthors, the global community of authors writing about their Alzheimer's and dementia caregiving experiences. On the lighter side, she's the author of a Young Adult sports novel Swim Season, based on her daughter's 11-year career as a varsity swimmer. She's also written several short stories. All of her work is published in paperback, ebook, and audiobook. A native Bostonian, she lives in New York’s Hudson Valley, and, when not writing or teaching classes in independent publishing, works as a campus nurse at a community college.

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Author Insight

Two Lies

Aerin desperately wants to fit in with the girls at Two Rivers, and resorts to telling two lies in her conversation with Mel, who quickly befriends her on Day One of swim season. The first lie is that she's never won any swim titles or championships. The truth is she's won many, and is considered a contender for the Olympic team. But in Two Rivers she's not swimming to win; she's swimming for peace of mind, it's her "therapy." She's no longer sure she wants to go to the Olympics or compete in college. So she lies about her accomplishments, downplaying her talent. The second lie is about her mother, the soldier, and what happened to her in Afghanistan. Aerin's not sure the kids at Two Rivers will understand.

Book Excerpt

Swim Season

“So, you never did tell me. What brings you to Two Rivers?”

Everybody asked that question, and I’d perfected an answer weeks before I moved here, lie number two. “My mom’s a nurse in the Army Reserve. She deployed to Afghanistan, and I chose to stay with her best friend Maggie Flynn and her family and finish school here.”

I hated lying, but I couldn’t tell anyone the real story. Last year, my mom had returned from a tour of duty in Afghanistan a wounded warrior, with shrapnel implanted in her hip, chronic pain, an opiate addiction, and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. She stole drugs from her employer, from her patients, and a coworker turned her in. Given her situation, the judge was lenient, but sentenced her to six months in a correctional facility where she would also receive treatment for her addiction. It was a long, sad story, and not one to share with the kids at Two Rivers High School. They’d never understand that Mom was more victim than criminal.

“What about your dad?” Mel asked.

“Not an option. My parents are divorced. He’s remarried and has a couple of bratty step kids. I stayed with them while my mom did her first tour of duty in Afghanistan, and I hated every minute. And my grandparents moved to some senior citizen condo in Florida last year so I couldn’t stay with them. When Maggie offered to let me stay here, I jumped at it.”

“Starting at a new school must be hard.”

I shrugged. “This is my third high school. It’s a piece of cake.”