Summary

The novel is narrated as a letter from eight-year-old Swiv to her absent father. In Part One, Chapter 1, Swiv was expelled from school for fighting, so she was staying home with her grandmother, Elvira. Her mother, Mooshie, was an actress working in a play and she was in her third trimester of pregnancy with a baby they were calling Gord. A family therapist suggested they should write letters to one another.

A man they called Jay Gatsby came over. He wanted to buy their house, but Swiv demanded $30 million. Elvira says that Mooshie “does the emotional work for the whole family, feeling everything ten times harder than is necessary” (7). She also says that she herself is “knock, knock, knockin' on heaven's door” (9).

Swiv's homeschooling, managed by Elvira, consisted of classes like “How to Dig a Winter Grave” (9), because Elvira had once been to...