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“Most people like to think they’re special, but the truth is that most people are basic.”
This is what sixteen-year-old Amanda Hollister has learned after years of lying about her identity. Her mother is a skilled con artist and by default, Amanda’s become an expert liar. The more scams Amanda watches her mother successfully run, the more she believes people are like sheep. They accept what they’re told and move on with their self-absorbed lives, too basic to see what’s right in front of them. But when the mother-daughter duo moves to the small town of Sunnyville, Texas, Amanda meets a new group of friends who are anything but basic. Eventually, she opens up to them about secrets she’s promised to keep hidden. She even finds herself falling in love. As Amanda makes real friends for the first time, she begins to wonder if the only “basic” person in her life is the girl in her mirror, the one who’s been too afraid of the truth to own up to it. After all, she’s been so cowardly that she hasn’t even told her friends her real name. BASIC is the story of a teenager whose exciting life of moving from state to state comes to a screeching halt when she lands in a small Texas town comes to an existential crossroads. Amanda must decide what sort of person she wants to become. Will she become an expert liar who knows how to work an unfair system? Or will she find the courage to stop lying and become a trustworthy friend? |