Melinda should be happy to get to travel to Mars with her dad.Everyone wants to go to space,don't they?But not 18-year-old Melinda.She had her life all planned out with her earthbound boyfriend,and she's not happy when dad springs this graduation trip on her.Still,it's for less than a year,she can start college when she gets back,and her boyfriend will still be waiting.
Once she arrives on Mars,she's surprised at how,well...civilized the colonies are.Of course,she makes a few enemies when she inadvertently insults colonists she meets by calling them the equivalent of savages.Still,she manages to make friends with a second-generation colonist named Alex and is soon torn between new love and old prejudices.