Ben Sonnenberg chronicles for us his coming-of-age at 19 Gramercy Park, once described by The New Yorker as "the greatest house...in private hands in New York." In a voice that is both candid and cultivated, he reflects upon his political, sexual, and aesthetic education as the son of one of America's most powerful men, the inventor of public relations, Benjamin Sonnenberg, Sr.

Sonnenberg takes the reader along on his flight into anarchy and sabotage-a life of sex and espionage spent in Cold War Europe and 1960s New York. At the same time, he spins a tale of universal human struggles: of family, marriage, divorce, sickness, and debt.