THE VACATION

THE VACATION is the story of a middle-class family of five who awaken early one morning to find that their suburban home is completely—and inexplicably—surrounded by the ocean.

Ted Hayes is an overworked, burned-out newspaper editor in his early 40s who is about to take his family on their annual one-week vacation to the Jersey Shore. Sick of his twenty-year job at a major newspaper, Ted longs to escape the daily 9-to-5 grind he has come to detest. After one of “those days,” even the prospect of a week off can’t convince him that his life hasn’t become little more than a bowl of cold oatmeal.

His wife, Beth, a high school math teacher home for the summer, is dealing with problems of her own—mainly coming to grips with the fact that her family is changing. Samantha Hayes, their oldest daughter, is about to leave for college in a few weeks, while Aaron, their fifteen-year-old son, seems destined to become a total bum with his lack of initiative and constant slacking off. Kyle, their youngest, gives Beth all she can handle simply by being his three-year-old self. So when Sam and Aaron express reservations about going on their annual vacation this year, Beth longs for the “good ol’ days” when they were younger and still did everything together as a family.

So what happens when they wake up and discover that their vacation has literally come to them? After the initial shock and panic, each of them begins to deal with the strange situation in their own way. At first, Ted is simply happy to be away from the rat race and takes the opportunity to kick back and relax, while Beth sees it as a chance to finally have some quality family time—a chance to sit down and actually share a meal with everyone present.

Sam, on the other hand, is furious. Her big opportunity to finally get out of the house and start her own life has been washed away. She’s stuck in the last place she wants to be: home. Aaron, surprisingly, becomes consumed by a “project,” while Kyle continues to just be Kyle.

But while the family adjusts and tries to figure out how to escape their strange predicament, nature has even more tricks in store. Mirages. Sharks. A time warp. Strange seaweed. A tidal wave. A hurricane.

All of it conspires against them and eventually forces the family to make a life-or-death decision: stay and risk dying of starvation, dehydration, or disease—or take their chances in a small boat they’ve built and sail off into the enigmatic, potentially endless sea that has engulfed them and made them hostages in their own home.