Hugely successful but impossibly neurotic songwriter Georgie Soloway is sliding into a mid-life crisis. He believes that all of his past romantic relationships have been destroyed not by his own failings but by the interference of the mysterious Harry Kellerman. Family, friends, and his psychiatrist cannot give him the help he seeks. When his father is diagnosed with a terminal illness, Georgie begins spending more and more time flying his personal aircraft, distancing himself physically, emotionally, and mentally from the real world.

Martin and Sally Cramer grew up on the hardscrabble Lower East Side, where Sally still teaches; meanwhile, Martin's the head of a fancy private school. Romantic dalliances with others convince them that they're meant to be together despite their differences, a decision that's cemented, oddly enough, by an over-the-top argument that draws the police.

Twelve-year-old Nick lives with his Uncle Murray, a Mr.Micawber-like Dickensian character who keeps hoping something won't turn up. What turns up is a social worker, who falls in love with Murray and a bit in love with Nick. As the child welfare people try to force Murray to become a conventional man (as the price they demand for allowing him to keep Nick), the nephew, who until now has gloried in his Uncle's iconoclastic approach to life, tries to play mediator. But when he succeeds, he is alarmed by the uncle's willingness to cave in to society in order to save the relationship.