Meredith Metzger is a devoted social worker in Rockford, Illinois, a hardscrabble city that residents love and loathe in near-equal measure. In her profession, Meredith sees the worst the city has to offer, both in terms of individual decisions and systemic inequities that drive poverty and its associated hardships. But when the pressure becomes too much and leaning on her co-workers isn’t enough, Meredith starts drinking, eventually endangering her son. She puts her colleague Jamal Glover in the difficult position of having to give custody of Meredith’s young son, Mateo, to her ex-husband, Roberto Alvarez. Meredith must then continue to help families in the same position she’s in—a cycle of desperation and difficulty as she struggles to get sober. Narrated by a chorus of fellow social workers, the novel examines a variety of situations in which people may come in contact with the child protection system. But while attempting to explore the gray areas of society, the book seems more interested in reminding the reader how hard it is to be a social worker than in building empathy for all the characters. The tone evokes exhausted resignation or worldly jadedness, making it hard for the reader to engage deeply with struggles the book seems to frame as inevitable and unending. Combined with uneven pacing, including narrative breaks punctuated by documents and newspaper clippings, this is a novel that asks a lot of readers without providing enough of a payoff.