SUCH SHELTERED LIVES

Three troubled celebrities seek treatment at an ultra-exclusive Hamptons rehab center with its own dark history.

Shelter Island–based Rush’s Recovery is so discreet it doesn’t have a website and relies on word-of-mouth referrals. There are only three cottages for three “guests” (not patients) at a time, and each guest is assigned their own care manager as well as a personal chef and housekeeper. The new arrivals include Amelia Blue Harris, the daughter of legendary 1990s rock musicians, who’s struggling with an eating disorder; Lord Edward of Exeter, the black-sheep scion of a British aristocratic family fighting alcoholism and a secret addiction to painkillers; and Florence Bloom, a fading pop star lying low after her latest tabloid scandal. “I’m not here for rehab,” she asserts to her therapist. Amelia Blue, too, has an ulterior motive for her stay; she wants to uncover the truth about her mother Georgia Blue’s fatal overdose 10 years earlier during a stint at Rush’s Recovery. Enlisting the help of Lord Edward, she sets out to explore the grounds at night in a quest for answers. Making her adult fiction debut, bestselling YA author Sheinmel sets up an intriguing premise for a suspenseful thriller but fails in the execution; it’s as if she couldn’t decide whether she was writing a family drama or a thriller. The slow-paced storyline, alternating between the three main first-person narrators and two different timelines, gradually climaxes in a predictable, clunky, and infuriating reveal. While the budding friendship between Amelia Blue and Lord Edward is beautifully drawn, it goes nowhere, and the other supporting characters are flatly portrayed.

A disappointment for Sheinmel’s fans.