Meet eighteen year-old Lucy and flamboyant Lish, two of the single moms whhol live there. Lucy has no idea who the father of her son is. Lish has four girls, and though she says she doesn't want a man around, she still pines for the father of her twins, a fire-eating busker who was just passing through town. Every Friday is "Deadbeat Dads" visiting day, but otherwise fathers aren't around much at Half-a-Life. They're mostly the kind of people whose heads get chopped off in pictures.

Life at Half-a-Life has its ups and downs. The welfare regulations are endless and the ratfink neighbours won't mind their own business. Wagons and cheap strollers are the only way to get to and from the grocery store, and its hard to make ends meet without the welfare minister trying to take away the child tax credit. So when Lish decides they should go to Colorado to find the fire-eater, Lucy can't help but be excited. They borrow a van held together with coat hangers and electrical tape, load it up with clothes and hit the road. Lucy knows they'll never find the fire-eater, but she doesn't know this will be the summer of her amazing luck.