Jane keeps lists. After all, how else can she keep track of her life? Desmond is fretting that his five-year relationship with Russell is too monogamous and settled. When the pair meet in Boston, they embark on a journey of self-discovery in which they will learn much about their own secrets and lies.

Jane Cody wanted a life of money, passion and painless tragedies but ends up with a doting husband, a precocious son, and a fast-paced job as a producer for a Boston television station. What went wrong?

In New York, Desmond Sullivan - biographer of demi-celebrities such as the forgotten torch singer Pauline Anderton - wonders how he ended up "stuck in something as pathetic" as a happy, secretly monogamous relationship with smart, sweet Russell.

Jane and Desmond meet in Boston and join forces to create a series of TV documentaries on America's cultural mediocrities. But their search for the truth about Anderton takes them on a journey of self discovery in which they learn more about their own secrets and lies than they ever wanted to know.