Both a coming-of-age story and a double mystery, an 11-year-old girl and her 14-year-old brother learn about life’s challenges during the summer of 1959 in California, a period of time that came to be called the Gidget era. Set in the formerly grand Surf and Sand Club Hotel, the story also takes the reader back to an even earlier period, the summer of 1938, and the ballroom dancing that the hotel.