Oakland, California. 2013.Anna is single mama to Phoenix, a teacher at the public school where he's starting kindergarten. In a Berkeley creative writing course, Anna meets Sam, a local tattoo artist and skateboarder who blogs about being gender-queer.Anna and Sam quickly fall in love, and the three become a family. But soon, Anna is given a death sentence: just six months to live. Wanting to enjoy the last of their time together, Anna decides to keep her b...

In January 2010, after a traumatic event, Nara flees Kamakura, Japan, for a communal Victorian on the Oakland/Berkeley border. In a Word doc, she tracks the half-truths she's telling her new roommates, Lily and Asha, along with her field notes on their queerdo hippunk vibes.In February, Nara accidentally tosses Lily's sourdough starter. In March, Nara crushes on Asha. In April, she escapes all the drama, isolating in the attic. In May, when the house hosts a naked party, Nara falls...

It's June 2020, and on top of the Covid shutdowns and racial justice revolution, Billie Knight's dad just died. She soon realizes he wasn't the one who hurt her when she was a kid-but then who the hell was?Billie, a fifty-year-old muralist and art teacher, sets out to solve the mystery of her trauma-from the off-grid queer community she built on Washington's Olympic Peninsula, through Seattle's autonomous zones and underground theaters, to her wild childhood home of Humboldt County...