The Line by Teri Hall

By teen lib

The Line by Teri Hall

Rachel's whole life is the Property and the Line. Ever since she can remember, Rachel has lived on the Property, which is outside of Bensen, the closest town. She and her mother live in a cottage on the Property which Ms. Moore owns and where she raises orchids in a greenhouse. Rachel's mother works for Ms. Moore in exchange for living at the cottage, so Rachel is on her own most of the time. And while Rachel doesn't mind her life so much on the Property, it is predictable, very predictable. Rachel often wishes that something would happen, anything to stave off the boredom.

So it really was inevitable that Rachel would become obsessed with Away, just on the other side of the Line. The Line is the local shorthand name for that portion of the National Border Defense System which enclosed the entire Unified States, keeping everyone in and everyone and everything else out. Away had been around forever even longer than old Ms. Moore, and it was taboo. So of course, Rachel is attracted to it like a moth to light. True facts about Away are hard to come by, so Rachel spends much of her free time reading all the questionable materials about Away that she can find on the net. But in the end, that is not enough. So Rachel tries to cross the Line into Away with disastrous results.