Kendall has failed as a poet, and now embezzlement seems like his next-best career option. Rebecca has failed to find customers for her mouse figurines, now the bailiffs are coming for her husband. Diane has failed to meet 'the one', but is thrilled to have found her path to motherhood through a turkey baster.

With his trademark humour, compassion and complex understanding of what it is to be human, Jeffrey Eugenides' stories elevate muddling through into something triumphant.