In an alternate Great Depressions NYC, a Jewish foreman investigates the true outputs of his factory as his eccentric German employer seeks to use an emerging idea called "industrivism," or the improvement of the human body through technology, created by a bored pulp writer, to recruit workers to fulfill his machinations. Without realizing, a pulp writer in an alternative 1920s New York City invents the idea of "industrivism" that earns her an audience with an eccentric German businessman. Meanwhile, a Jewish foreman investigate the true purpose of the factory and unearths his employer's dark past and future machinations.

A Jewish communist quit working at an editorial bureau where his co-workers are bothered by his leftist ideology because of his boss' praises of him.

Two men putting on a production for their New York theater company seek out a legendary, elderly actor, but upon finding him, they meet a man as dilapidated as the theater he once worked for.

A Black, southern house servant with internalized racism, joins her mistress on a visit to another region, where she observes Black people acting with something she abhors: autonomy.

A Canadian graduate student and his wife are living in France and often socialize with their peers at concerts and dinner parties. They soon make friends with an established novelist, but as the student continues to meet people he begins to question who he can trust and who his real friends are.

Having sacrificed his dream job to financially support his marriage, a man realizes there is sexual tension between his wife and his friend. Ultimately, he makes tough decisions about both his friendship and his marriage.

A middle-aged man and his wife struggle to keep up with their teenage daughter who they just adopted six months ago, especially when she takes interest in a boy her age.

A gas station worker develops a friendship with a diner waitress that edges towards intimacy, but another man in her life prevents them from getting any closer.

Upon returning to Paris after a decade-long hiatus wandering the French countryside and writing an epic, a poet encounters an enigmatic young woman who believes he is a god and wants to be his disciple,

Searching for a muse to inspire a novel he is attempting to write, an author in San Francisco finds his passions ignited by something much more sinister.