Sheila Callaghan's Dead City is inspired by James Joyce's Ulysses. On June 16, 2004 (the 100th anniversary of the day Bloom and Dedalus wandered Joyce's Dublin), Samantha Blossom's odyssey begins over breakfast when she discovers a letter from her husband's lover. Reacting to the sting of her husband's infidelity and from the pain of her son's death, she embarks on a surreal journey in which she encounters a Manhattan she has never seen. Her life starts to spiral out of control and she becomes caught up in the wake of a punk-rock poet half her age.

What begins as a chance encounter turns into obsession as she follows this young girl through the streets of her weird and wonderful city, ending in an underground sex club in the Meat Packing District where anything is possible.