Allie is a product of the nineties, a child of a rich but dysfunctional who has turned to grunge music for entertainment and counterculture for solace. Finally though, her corporate ruler father decides he's going to get something for all the money he's laying out on her college education, and informs his daughter that she will be transferring to a good, old-fashioned school in southern France, where they will civilize her. But it turns out that Allie's California dreaming does prepare her for life. Because Allie does not arrive at the college south of Paris that she was supposed to attend—but Somewhere Else. What happens next will give new meaning to the term "transfer student" and "publish or perish."