Our Wonderful Selves

In a sharply observed opening, the novel introduces the Rendall family as a study in contradictions. A premature infant, Wynne, is cradled in a household where his mother’s emotional detachment feels almost mechanical, while his grandfather’s flamboyant, avant‑garde art haunts the lineage like an unfulfilled prophecy. The stark contrast between cold domestic routine and a desperate yearning for artistic legacy sets a tone that is both witty and unsettling.

The narrative follows Robert Everett Rendall, the grandson who inherits his forebear’s creative fire but rejects the oppressive expectations. At sixteen he abandons the house, taking a modest job among tea‑tasters, only to encounter a city whose rigid manners clash with his inherited restlessness. His flight from familial pressure hints at a larger struggle between tradition and the desire to forge an individual path.

Through keen, satirical prose the story sketches a family caught between stifling conformity and the allure of rebellious imagination, inviting listeners to contemplate how much of ourselves we inherit and how much we dare to reinvent.