Thurlow Dan is the founder of the Helix, a cult that promises to cure loneliness in the twenty-first century. With its communes and speed-dating, mixers and confession sessions, the Helix has become a national phenomenon — and attracted the attention of governments worldwide. But Thurlow, camped out in his Cincinnati headquarters, is lonely. And his ex-wife, Esme, is the only one he wants. They were a family once; they had a child together. For Esme’s part, she’s a covert agent who has spent her life spying on Thurlow, mostly in an effort to protect him from the law. Now, with her superiors demanding results, Esme recruits four misfits to botch a reconnaissance mission in Cincinnati. But when Thurlow abducts them, he ignites a siege of the Helix House that could keep him and Esme apart forever. With fiery, ecstatic prose, Maazel takes us on a ride through North Korea’s guarded interior, a city of vice beneath Cincinnati, and a commune housed in a Virginia factory, while Thurlow, Esme, and their daughter search for a way to be a family again. is a sprawling and original novel that reminds us our Nation's deepest problems cannot be fixed by the simple formulas that so frequently beguile us.
