Mother. For many, this is a comforting word, but for Philip, Mother is a controlling, manipulative monster who won't let him live his life. Philip McReynolds is a young man coming of age in a world that says that greed, selfishness and being sexually experienced are things that are expected of a young man. However, this is not the type of person Philip is. He is a reader, a writer, a dreamer of dreams, and when he meets the girl of his dreams, a 17-year-old girl named Amanda, he begins the journey to break free of his mother's possessiveness and become Amanda's knight in shining armor.