- He began to explain his temporary move back to suburbia, the saga of the failed offspring back at Mom and Stepdad’s. He mock-shuddered as he said the word suburbia; we both sneered together at the idea of suburbia, but who are we kidding? We exist because of suburbia. Suburbia is a freak’s dreamworld, a world of extra rooms upstairs and long, lazy afternoons with no interference. A place where you can listen to your LPs for hours on end. You can live in your room, your own rent-free corner of the universe, and create a world of pleasure and interest entirely centred on yourself and your interior aesthetic and logic.

It would be invidious to compare Spiotta’s book to Philip Roth’s American Pastoral, but I will. I prefer Spiotta.