In Curtis White's first novel, he attempts to "imagine a place in which humans can live." This utopia is definitely not San Lorenzo-- a post-war, prefabricated suburb in California-- where White grew up and which is the basis for this novel. "Thematically, THE IDEA OF HOME is about the failure of a certain idea of home in American culture. This idea was a failure because it was incapable of examining its genocidal roots, how destructive it had to be in order to come into being, and, because of that poisoned past, how flawed its present is"--Curtis White. "THE IDEA OF HOME regurgitates a form of American madness into one of the cleverest, most lucid free-for-alls I can remember"--Paul Aster