Summary

The prologue is nominally presented as an old film entitled Herbert and Dunham Ride Bicycles (1896). The narrator, a boy named Dunham, recounts himself and his friend Herbert riding bicycles in St. Augustine, Florida. They encounter a large, strange-looking creature near a river. Dunham is suddenly struck by the idea that time is nonlinear, and that the monster is actually composed of his and Herbert’s future selves.

Chapter 1 takes place approximately in the present day, and it is narrated by the book’s protagonist, Balaam “B.” Rosenberger Rosenberg. He is a divorced film critic in his fifties, and he is driving to St. Augustine to do research for a film studies project. B. is conceited and is ignorant to his personal flaws, such as his physical and intellectual vanity. B. believes himself to be very progressive, and he indicates that he is dating...