Sheila Hersh is spending her early thirties leading a double life. She hangs out at the cool Firenze Bar at night, has a closetful of black clothes, and is even the reluctant star of an underground film. By day she writes ad copy for her father's store, Hersh's House of Mattresses (where she is instructed to use a lot of exclamation points), and manages to keep the rest of the employees - her outspoken, ambitious aunt and her stylish but ineffectual uncle -- on an even keel.

The only thing that really keeps her interest is a mysterious book of poems that belonged to her dead mother....