They had been the perfect family: liberal gentrifiers, the avant-garde of the Whole Foods generation.

But the Berglunds are struggling to live in an ever more confusing world. Walter, an environmental lawyer and commuter cyclist, has taken a job with Big Coal. Patty, the ideal hands-on mother and wife, is growing unhinged in front of the neighbours’ attentive eyes.

Their son has moved in with the Republican family next door, and Richard Katz, outré rocker and Walter’s best friend and rival, has re-entered their lives.

‘A masterpiece’  New York Times

‘Stupendous, magnificent, unforgettable, witty and rich. A great American novel’  Spectator  

‘Writing in prose that dazzles, Franzen has now written the two novels that best define modern America’  Independent

‘A masterpiece. Franzen skewers the particularity of modern life and love like no one else’  Daily Telegraph