In 1960s Omaha, Nebraska, Jeffrey Koterba grew up with a large family in a small house. The house was full-to-bursting with garage-sale treasures and televisions his father repaired and sold for extra money. His father was a volatile, hard-drinking, one-time jazz drummer whose self regard bordered on mania, who dreamed of hitting it big and blamed his family for his failures, who believed the government controlled the weather and that the world, including the family under his roof, was arrayed against him. If that were not enough, he was subject to violent facial and vocal tics--symptons of Tourette's Syndrome, a condition his son Jeffrey inherited.

Inklings is the story of a difficult childhood, but not exclusively so; from the canyons of broken electronics, the piles of liquor bottles, the screaming matches, failed inventions and lightning strikes emerges the portrait of a family doing their best to love one another and, against long odds, succeeding. In time, Jeffrey fights his way out from beneath the shadow of his domineering father and clinging mother fo follow his lifelong dream of cartooning for a living--he is now a widely syndicated politcal cartoonist--and reluctantly embraces his role in the family he once thought he had escaped.