Eureka Boudreaux is a senior from Evangeline. She had two good friends named Cat and Brooks. Her parents are divorced and her father has remarried a woman named Rhoda and they have twins named William and Claire. Eureka has recently lost her mother to a rogue wave in which Eureka survived but is having problems recovering from. 
 It is a weird thing with me that even if the story can sag, if the lead character is interesting to me, I can over look it and Eureka was very interesting in that she's truly struggling with the death of her beloved mother, a stepmother who means well but is overbearing, a father who wants to keep the peace, and finally, her promise to her mother to never cry. 
 After an accident with a strange boy, the mystery of Eureka's mother's order to never cry begins to come clear. 
 "Teardrop" isn't so much the adventure but the start of the adventure. Through most of the novel, the reader becomes familiar with Eureka herself. Some side characters are throwaways (ex: Sheriffs and police who are given names but not much else) but others give a nice flavor (Eureka's Uncle Beau is a good example). 
 The end is a little chaotic and one incident at the end is a bit "huh?" but I have a feeling that in the second book, that "huh?" moment will have a repercussion.