This is a significant novel featuring Ted, a white, privileged middle-class man, struggling to come to terms with his disintegrating extended family of eccentrics, addicts, and potential-killers – and how they should fit into the emerging new scheme (or chaos) of 21st century American life. From racism to immigration, religion to shooting sprees, social media to dementia, this is a funny, smart, and sometimes acerbically-startling dissection of a society on the edge.