The Lede to Our Undoing
1970s rust-belt America. The era of civil rights, women's rights, and gay rights, as well as the birth of the environmental movement. Twins Jake and Wren are raised in the white-flight suburb of Laurentine, not far from an industrial metropolis that was named in a much greener time the Forest City. The twin's parents, Harry and Florrie, are doing their best to keep their offspring on the straight and narrow, along the lines of what today we would call MAGA America, though before it got the name. But the two are not very good at coloring inside the lines. Wren falls in love with an African-American youth named Donald, and Jake falls in love first with Romeo and then Peacoat––with traumatic results. Their story is told by the family mutt, Molly, whose outsider status offers the reader a view on human foibles, and prejudice, that we haven't seen in fiction before.