Lethem adapted the novel from several unpublished short stories he had written, all about catastrophic, apocalyptic events.

[1][2] The protagonist is a survivalist named Chaos, who lives in an abandoned megaplex in Wyoming after an apparent nuclear strike.

The residents of his town of Hatfork are reliant on a sinister messianic figure named Kellogg for food.

When Moon and Melinda reach San Francisco, hallucinogenic drugs play a role in altered perceptions that provide access to other characters in this world, as in The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch.

Elsewhere, it is argued that the depicted realities splintered away from each other to provide resistance to a hive-like alien invasion of Earth.