Summary

In the short introduction “Note to Self,” a young, unnamed narrator describes that he has completely failed in both attempts to win a girl’s attention, and also in a personal battle against a real estate developer. The narrator has been somehow detained in a small office by the real estate developer.

Chapter 1 begins three weeks earlier, on a Sunday evening. As is tradition in the narrator’s family, the Zamora family, the huge extended family gathers for a weekly dinner in the restaurant that they own and operate together. It is summer time, and the narrator’s friends from school, Bren and Mop, are also allowed to join. The family is presided over by the kindly Abuela, who has an especially close relationship with the narrator amongst all of her grandchildren. The Sánchez family arrives from Spain, consisting...