Bernard Miller, a fifteen-year-old Jewish boy, promotes an affair between his aunt Minna, and his cousin Willy, in order to have a sanctuary where he can live after he angrily leaves his family.

This outstanding family novel, set in a Jewish neighborhood of Chicago, is ¿the fullest articulation of the generational conflict between Jewish fathers and [sins],¿ writes Alexander Bloom in his 1986 book Prodigal Sons. The central character, a 15-year-old boy in rebellion against the petit bourgeois values of his family, engineers an affair between his flamboyant aunt and his easy-going Gentile cousin by marriage. He then leaves his father and moves into the house of this new couple, where he experiences the excitement and problems of an open relationship.