When Benjamin Herald visited the suburb he grew up in outside of Pittsburgh, he noticed that it had become poorer, more diversified in terms of the population, the infrastructure was old and in disrepair and the educational system was suffering. He pursued this and began investigating suburbs of Los Angeles, Dallas, Chicago and Atlanta as well as his own hometown. Herold zeroed in on one family in each of these suburbs to help him and his readers understand the change. 

I read this work of nonfiction because I live in a suburb and one of the suburbs Benjamin Herold describes is 10 miles from my home. At first I kept getting the five families and their suburbs mixed up, but eventually I was able to keep them straight. The author researched each suburb and he describes the fears, goals and daily lives of the families, but I never got a clear understanding of how to solve the suburban dilemma.