The book begins with an essay by Orange, detailing "brief and jarring vignettes revealing the violence and genocide that Indigenous people have endured, and how it has been sanitized over the centuries.

A teenager, Orvil Red Feather, turns to Google in search of the answer of the question of "What does it mean to be a real Indian,"[7] and in the mirror, wearing tribal regalia, sees only "a fake, a copy, a boy playing dress-up.

"[7] One character struggles with his place in society as "ambiguously nonwhite," while Edwin Black, "overweight and constipated, has a graduate degree in Native American literature but no job prospects — a living symbol of the moribund plight of Indian culture in the United States.

"[6] Thomas Frank, who is an alcoholic and has lost his job working as a janitor, wrestles with a life lived suspended between his mother, who is white, and his "one-thousand-percent Indian" father who is a medicine man.

Jacquie Red Feather faces sobriety from the perspective of a substance abuse counselor in the wake of her daughter's suicide thirteen years prior.

[11] Jacquie and her half-sister Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield recall their childhood experiences in the Native American occupation of Alcatraz island.

All storylines and characters eventually coalesce around a powwow taking place at the Oakland–Alameda County Coliseum, where Octavio, Tony, Calvin, and others have smuggled in 3D printed handguns in an attempt to rob the event to repay drug debts.

"[5][8] For Native people, Orange writes that cities and towns represent "buried ancestral land, glass and concrete and wire and steel, unreturnable covered memory.

"[18] According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Orange brings "authority and intelligence" to the stories of his characters: In the novel, "[d]islocation and grief are constant, yet again and again we encounter resistance and resilience.

"[19] Publishers Weekly summarized the work as "breathtaking" and a "haunting and gripping story,"[20] while The Millions dubbed it "one of our most anticipated books of the year.

"[21] The National Book Review called There There "spectacular," "a work of fiction of the highest order," landing "on the shores of a world that should be abashed it was unaware it had been awaiting his arrival.

"[22] Egyptian-Canadian novelist and journalist Omar El Akkad wrote: There There is a miraculous achievement, a book that wields ferocious honesty and originality in service of telling a story that needs to be told.

"[6] The San Francisco Chronicle described the prologue as "so searing that it set off a four-day publisher bidding war for reasons that are immediately apparent.