Mom has just died, is a patch of floating dust on the Columbia slough. We see the world through the eyes of her ex-hockey player son: divorced, depressed, ready to settle in for thirteen more weeks of unemployment checks, beer, and reading his mother's books, not thinking, if he can help it, about what happened the last time he was on the ice. Along with her library, Mom has also left him her ancient iMac, a yellow Post-it, his name written in orange felt tip pen on it, stuck to its screen. Sam's sister, helping him clear their mother's house, assumes her sarcastic older-sister self, tells Sam that Mom is leaving him her brain. Instead, when he opens the file entitled THREE to GET READY, he finds three stories written by his mother, which will change everything.