In a first-class lounge at JFK airport, our narrator listens as Jeff Cook, a former classmate he only vaguely remembers, shares the uncanny story of his adult life --- a life that changed course years before, the moment he resuscitated a drowning man. Jeff reveals that after that traumatic, galvanizing morning on the beach, he was compelled to learn more about the man whose life he had saved. Upon discovering that the man is renowned art dealer Francis Arsenault, Jeff begins to surreptitiously visit his Beverly Hills gallery. Although Francis does not seem to recognize him as the man who saved his life, he nevertheless casts his legendary eye on Jeff and sees something worthy. Their paths come together and diverge in dizzying ways until the novel’s staggering ending.

28-year-old Oppen Porter --- an open-hearted, bicycle-riding, binocular-toting, self-described "slow absorber" --- unspools into a cassette recorder a tale of self-determination, from "village idiot" to "man of the world," for the benefit of his unborn son.