A Field Guide to the North American Family
For years, the Hungates and the Harrisons have coexisted peacefully in the same Long Island neighborhood, enjoying the pleasures and weathering the pitfalls of their suburban habitat. But when the patriarch of one family dies unexpectedly, the survivors face a stark imperative: adapt or face extinction. In sixty-three interlinked vignettes and striking accompanying photographs, the novella cuts multiple paths–which can be reconstructed in any order–through the lives of its richly imagined characters. Part art object, part Choose Your Own Adventure, A Field Guide to the North American Family is an innovative and deeply personal look at the ties that bind, as well as a poignant meditation on connection in a fragmented world.​
PRAISE FOR A FIELD GUIDE TO THE NORTH AMERICAN FAMILY
“A gorgeous labyrinth of a book, A Field Guide to the North American Family reads like magic, like a private book of spells meant to keep away all the things that have already happened.”
—Rivka Galchen, author of Atmospheric Disturbances
They came to Long Island in search of sunlight. Not the kind that trickled down like water through the fingers of a skyline, but the kind that spread like butter across a green expanse of lawn. They came to Long Island for the relative quiet, the soothing bugsong in summer, in winter the cold crash of waves. They came for the view of those waves, for the big picture window in the living room that looked out over the pool, the trees, the backyard, the breakwater. They came for the community, the neighborhood, the schools. All it cost was a thirty-year mortgage, club dues and greens fees, and train fare to the city five days a week. There were good years in these houses and in these yards. There were pickup basketball games in the driveways, with the kids. There were parties. There were Halloweens and Thanksgivings. And if, after the switch to standard time, they got home well after dark; and if gradually the kids became strangers; and if when the lights were out they only fell asleep exhausted . . . well, was that so different from what their own parents had done, chasing their own dreams of America?