Alan is a middle-aged entrepreneur in contemporary Toronto who has devoted himself to fixing up a house in a bohemian neighborhood. This naturally brings him in contact with the house full of students and layabouts next door, including a young woman who, in a moment of stress, reveals to him that she has wings—wings, moreover, that grow back after each attempt to cut them off.
Alan understands. He himself has a secret or two. His father is a mountain, his mother is a washing machine, and among his brothers are a set of Russian nesting dolls.
Now two of the three nesting dolls, Edward and Frederick, are on his doorstep—well on their way to starvation because their innermost member, George, has vanished. It appears that yet another brother, Davey, whom Alan and his other siblings killed years ago, may have returned … bent on revenge.
Under such circumstances it seems only reasonable for Alan to involve himself with a visionary scheme to blanket Toronto with free wireless Internet connectivity, a conspiracy spearheaded by a brilliant technopunk who builds miracles of hardware from parts scavenged from the city's dumpsters. But Alan's past won't leave him alone—and Davey is only one of the powers gunning for him and all his friends.
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“After finishing Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town, I was surprised to find
that botherment and uncertainty had vanished into satisfaction. Somehow this loose-jointed,
wandering, ramshackle compendium of casual weirdness (perfectly expressed in
the title) produces the kind of intimacy—even authenticity—more often
associated with a personal journal, a blog, even autobiography. Yes, the
mountain’s son will have to confront sheer Evil, but he also struggles with the
complexities of friendship, outsiderhood, progressive ideals, and the awkward
hinterland between sex and love.”
—
Locus