Summary

Chapter 1, “Trouble Swallowing,” opens in media res on the novel’s unnamed protagonist is lying in her driveway, bleeding to death. The narration states that she has been shot with a gun. The protagonist is an American woman of Indian descent. She is 43 years old. She is married, has children, and lives in a suburb of North Carolina. The novel is told in flashbacks of her life, with her death as the framing device.

Chapter 2, “Moving Day in the Ordinary World,” shifts back in time several years, to when she, her husband, and her three daughters moved to a new house. The protagonist's husband is Caucasian. The protagonist worked as a journalist, mostly writing obituaries. Before then, she worked as a crime reporter, which was more exciting and which she had enjoyed more. While dying, the protagonist has an out-of-body experiences; she watches her...