David Moreton

1984, Sandusky, Ohio. A naive 17-year-old navigates heartbreak and self-expression as he explores his sexuality.

Dean has been stumped for some time in his attempt to produce a follow-up to "I was a Teenage Speed Freak," his incredibly successful graphic novel. His fans expect great things from him and his editor, Louise, is hounding him. Instead of working, however, Dean spends his time searching for his Argentine lover Pablo, who went out one night for cigarettes and never came back.

At her father's funeral, Junior Talmadge remembers back 30 years to the last time she saw her Dad: the summer of 1979. Junior was graduating from college and had just gotten engaged. Her dad surprises the family when he arrives with a brand new motor home. He entices his kids into a final "family summer vacation," the only way he knows how: he tells them he has cancer. Thus begins the family's road trip to California, and their quest to become a real American family, the old-fashioned way, by being on a real American TV game show. As the family arrives in LA to audition for the show, secret after secret is revealed about their dad, forcing Junior and her brothers to confront the reality of who their Dad really is.

When a budding romance falls apart, and a scholarship to USC gets yanked out from under him, 17-year-old Salvi hits the mean streets of Palm Springs and gets swept up into an incendiary weekend of partying, gun violence and sexual ambiguity.