Commitment

The story of a family whose single mom, fighting mental illness, slowly becomes unable to raise her children, and their collective search for a place in the world.
A mother drives her eldest son, Walter, from their Los Angeles home to the University of California at Berkeley. No one realizes it, but this will be her last fully responsible act before breaking down completely and being committed to a mental hospital, leaving her three children behind. Holding tight to his ambitions to become an architect, Walter copes with the sudden loss of financial and emotional support and becomes determined to write his own destiny. His younger siblings, on the other hand, must stay behind and keep their family afloat until they, too, can leave for good: while Lina dreams of starting over as an artist in New York City, Donnie begins down a dangerous path that jeopardizes his life. As each child navigates the world opening before them, they remain tethered to each other, their mother, and a past they cannot outrun. Spanning years and ferrying readers across the country, Commitment tracks each child's challenging journey away from home and into a future they're determined to make their own. Emotionally riveting and brilliantly told, it is a gripping portrait of a troubled yet captivating family, and the work of a writer at the peak of her powers.