The following version of this book was used to create the guide: Taylor, Brandon. The Late Americans. Penguin Random House LLC, 2023.

Brandon Taylor's novel The Late Americans is written from the third person point of view and organized into nine titled chapters. Each chapter of the novel traces the storyline of a distinct character. However, all of the chapters are set in Iowa City during the same temporal era. The reader can experience the chapters as individual short stories, or as sections of one cohesive novel. The unconventional narrative structure enacts the author's overarching thematic explorations. For the sake of clarity, the following summary abides by a similar structure and uses the present tense.

In Chapter 1, "The Late Americans," Seamus is a poetry student at Iowa. Although he loves poetry and cares about his art, he does not feel that his cohort takes the field seriously. He is particularly disgusted with their seeming obsession with writing about their own trauma. Convinced that no one is truly happy, Seamus scoffs at the unoriginality of writing about one's own pain.

Paying his way through school, Seamus works at a local hospice. One day, a man named Bert asks to bum a smoke while Seamus is on his break. Bert then offers to show Seamus something. Seamus follows him to a rundown trailer park. Bert extracts his penis and demands that Seamus perform fellatio. On the way home, Seamus makes a remark that upsets Bert. He puts his cigarette out on Seamus's cheek. Later that night, Seamus ducks into a local bar, convinced that Bert is following him. When he gets home later, he writes the first two lines of a new poem.

In Chapter 2, "Beasts of the Field," Fyodor's relationship with Timo is defined by tumult and arguing. The primary source of conflict in their relationship is Fyodor's job at the local butchery. Timo believes the work is cruel and violent and constantly nags Fyodor to quit. One night, Fyodor becomes so tired of Timo's digs that he kicks him out and ends the relationship.

Fyodor and Timo run into each other at a café and later at the laundromat. They start to realize how much they miss each other. After having sex in the laundromat bathroom, Fyodor wonders about the connection between hatred and love.

In Chapter 3, "Ivan the Terrible and His Son Ivan," Ivan feels powerless in his relationship with Goran. This is particularly because Goran's family has money and Ivan's does not. Ivan is struggling to pay for his education and to pay his parents back for helping him with his previous schooling. Per his friend Noah's suggestion, he starts uploading pornographic videos of himself to the internet. The money helps him help his parents.

When Ivan tells Goran he has secured an internship in New York for the summer, Goran is upset. Ivan tries to understand and hopes they can work things out.

In Chapter 4, "The Kings of Norway," Timo has been in love with his friend Goran for some time. Spending an afternoon watching him practice piano and witnessing his intimacy with his boyfriend Ivan, however, only worsens Timo's emotional confusion. On the night of his birthday, Timo leaves Goran and Ivan's company and goes to Fyodor's. Their evening together changes Timo's perspective.

In Chapter 5, "Gorgon Head," Seamus submits a poem to his seminar about his fraught maternal relationship and Bert's assault. Initially, his classmates think that he is making fun of them. One student, however, understands the meaning of the poem and empathizes with Seamus.

In Chapter 6, "Let Us Sit Upon the Ground," although Bert is violent and abusive towards Noah, he proves incapable of ending the relationship. Something in him connects with something in Bert. Once Noah finally secures a place with a studio in Portland, he tells Bert goodbye. Upon leaving his property, he realizes he can never engage in another such relationship.

In Chapter 7, "Sussex, Essex, Wessex, Northumbria," Bea lives alone in Iowa City. Her life there is defined by her isolation. With no friends and little contact with her family, she often feels suffocated by her alienation. When she encounters a deer in the yard one day, however, she begins to realize she is not as alone as she thought.

In Chapter 8, "Local Economies," when Fatima tells her classmate Cheney that she has been tired during rehearsal because she recently had an abortion, Cheney is outraged. He accuses Fatima of killing a child and sexually assaults her. Although Fatima reports him afterwards, many people contest her story.

In Chapter 9, "Altruism, Empathy, Passion, and Pain," Daw invites the members of his dance cohort to his family's house in the Adirondacks. Although the trip is meant to be celebratory, Daw feels emotionally overwhelmed. The house is the location where his sister was kidnapped as a child. When he finally tells his friend and new lover Stafford about the tragedy, Daw begins to process it for the first time. By the end of the trip, he realizes that his friends have brought happiness to the house and to his life.