The Ruins of California is a coming-of-age story about young and precocious Inez Ruin, whose surname may have a lot to say for her family. Her father Paul is maddening and intriguing, charming and self-obsessive, brilliant and unable to stay in a monogamous relationship. He divorces Inez’s mother Connie and inevitably, a long string of girlfriends comes to fill his life. Inez is forced to grow up in two worlds, the stable one provided by her mother and Grandmother, both hardworking Peruvian-born women, and the world of her father and Grandmother Ruin, old money and just as old traditions including horse riding, tea parties, and lessons in refinement. On top of this, Inez must navigate the Californian highschool landscape of sex, drugs, art, surfing, Nixon, and the ultimate goal of not making a big deal out of anything. The climb to maturity is a long and difficult one; Inez finds that while she may have the strength to make it, her beloved half-brother may not.

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