A teenage girl seeks the truth about her long-absent father; local athletes gang-rape a mentally handicapped girl and the town is eager to cover up the crime; a Jewish refugee from Nazi Europe wants to leave her heritage behind in her new land; a young girl learns there are hidden costs to becoming a model; a summer romance with an older woman teaches a teenage boy hard lessons about the difference between physical and emotional love. These are just some of the incidents that inform the young adult novels of Erika Tamar, whose books for young adults explore, as she once noted, "the unexpected truth that lies under the perceived image of a person, as well as the many contradictory perceptions people have of the same event."

In titles such as Blues for Silk Garcia, Good-bye, Glamour Girl, High Cheekbones, Out of Control, Fair Game, and The Things...