A fascinating but ultimately frustrating second novel about a family and how it is destroyed by the father’s illness.  Tim, Jayne, and Bekah Farnsworth are a typical American suburban family until Tim is visited by a condition that remains undiagnosed by medical experts despite trips to Mayo, Cleveland Clinic, and Switzerland—-he has a compulsion to walk.  When the condition asserts itself for the second time, his partnership in a prestigious law firm goes up in smoke, his wife becomes an alcoholic, and his overweight teen age daughter withdraws.  Finally, Tim abandons hope and hits the road, walking to the West Coast and finally dying in a snowstorm in the Rockies after reconnecting to wife (who dies of cancer in the meantime) and daughter who has a child, marries, and has a successful career as a singer.  At the end of the day, I never connected meaningfully with the characters and wasn’t passionate about their outcomes.  The writing about Tim’s walking is powerful and compelling, but it’s all about characters, isn’t it?