Jonathan Franzen

"It's December 23, 1971, and the Hildebrandt family is at a crossroads. The patriarch, Russ, the associate pastor of a suburban Chicago church, is poised to break free of a marriage he finds joyless--unless his brilliant and unstable wife, Marion, breaks free of it first. Their eldest child, Clem, is coming home from college afire with moral absolutism, having taken an action that will shatter his father. Clem's sister, Becky, long the social queen...

After almost fifty years as a wife and mother, Enid Lambert is ready to have some fun. Unfortunately, her husband Alfred is losing his sanity to Parkinson's disease, and their children have long since flown the family nest to face the catastrophes of their own lives.

In [this book], which gathers essays and speeches written mostly in the past five years, Jonathan Franzen returns with renewed vigor to the themes -- both human and literary -- that have long preoccupied him. Whether exploring his complex relationship with his uncle, recounting his young adulthood in New York, or offering an illuminating look at the global seabird crisis, these pieces contain all the wit and disabused realism that we've come to expect...