Julia, a professor of creative writing and a writer as well as the mother of two young black sons and the wife of an African American man, wrestles with a loss of control as her sons grow toward the point of leaving home. Their leaving is complicated by racial tensions in their city and by Julia’s growing sense of loss of self. The novel follows Julia’s odyssey through a sometimes violently conflicted world, while at the same time interrogating the forms of fiction, autobiography and memoir. In the end, loss of control is combined with what remains of her sense of power and identity as a mother and a writer.