[2] The novel explores the relationships between these central characters, paying specific attention to the passing of time, the interplay between the past and the present, and the bonds formed by young, old, and parental love.

[1] Modern Lovers is Emma Straub's fourth published book, following the novels Laura Lamont's Life in Pictures, The Vacationers, and a collection of short stories titled, Other People We Married.

[2][5] Modern Lovers follows Elizabeth, Andrew, and Henry Marx, a family living in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn, and their friends Zoe, Jane, and Ruby Kahn-Bennet over the course of a full summer.

Elizabeth, Andrew, and Zoe met at Oberlin College in the 1980s and formed a punk rock group called Kitty's Mustache with their mutual friend, Lydia Greenbaum.

[4] After Lydia's departure from Oberlin, Elizabeth, Andrew, and Zoe graduated and moved to Ditmas Park, where they began to form families of their own.

[5] In the present day, Elizabeth is working as a real estate agent, Zoe as the co-owner of a restaurant, Hyacinth, and Andrew is trying to figure out his next career.

[4] While working through their marital strife, Zoe and Jane attempt to encourage their daughter, Ruby, a recent high school graduate, to retake the SAT's in order to improve her results enough to get into college.

There, Ruby and Henry, Elizabeth and Andrew's son, begin to bond and eventually start to date, developing a fast and furious summer romance.

[7] In contrast, through co-managing Hyacinth, Zoe and Jane begin to rekindle their relationship and rediscover their lost passion through their mutual love of food.

[5] At Oberlin College in the 1980s, Elizabeth was the guitarist for Kitty's Mustache, a punk rock band she formed with Andrew and her friends Zoe and Lydia.

[3] In the present day, Andrew becomes involved with EVOLVEment, an illegal yoga studio and juice bar, as part of a mid-life crisis.

[4] Harry and Ruby bond during an SAT preparatory class he takes the summer after his junior year of high school, and they begin a relationship, which quickly becomes serious.

Michio Kakutani of the New York Times wrote, "She [Emma Straub] captures the jagged highs and lows of adolescence with freshness and precision, and the decades-long relationships of old college friends with a wry understanding of how time has both changed (and not changed) old dynamics,"[7] while Carol Memmott of The Washington Post observed, "Like ABC’s “Modern Family,” “Modern Lovers” celebrates the updated look and feel of familial love and all of its complexities.