After she meets nineteen-year-old Ishmael, Joni Byrnes stops caring about home, school and swim team. Instead, she embraces Ishmael's hippy lifestyle of music, pot and Herman Hesse. When she sells marijuana for Ishmael, Joni gains notoriety as Joni Juana -- but her newfound popularity ends in a bust. While Ishmael goes to prison, Joni avoids juvie when she agrees to spend the summer of 1969 at Camp Saint Augustine of Hippo teaching poor black kids to swim. Joni comes to camp with two joints stuffed in her cutoffs pockets. As the only white counselor, she's greeted with -- "You couldn't find no crackers to save?" In a year marked by the Viet Nam War, pressure for civil rights, Helter Skelter, the first moonwalk and three days of peace and music at Woodstock, Joni's choices dictate her future. With the end of camp a week away, Joni's decision to smoke a joint jeopardizes the respect she's earned and the agreement that kept her out of juvie. BECOMING JONIKA is a 104,000 word novel about coming-of-age during a year of cultural upheaval and re-imagination of the American dream. At its heart, it's a story of alienation, acceptance and accountability.