Grady Tripp is a middle-aged University Professor with a penchant for pot and screwed up relationships. He is unable to complete the long-awaited follow-up to his award-winning novel and it is now over 2,500 pages long. His brilliant and sexually confused student James Leer is a troubled young writer obsessed with Hollywood suicides and prone to fabrication and petty thievery. In their odyssey through the streets of Pittsburgh, Grady and James are joined by Grady's pregnant mistress, his gay and bizarre editor and a beautiful student lodger. The result is a wildly comic, poignantly moving and ultimately wonderful satisfying read.
