This book is about freedom; freedom from established institutions such as schools, jobs and marriage laws. A person's biography could deal only with his/her movement within this institutional framework. But this would exclude the part of life that falls between the cracks of the social structure. It is this other part of life that is covered by 'Rosebuds', as expressed in the extra-institutional life of its (un-heroic) hero, Peter Pham. Peter is not a bad person, but he is endowed with a strong natural attraction to certain women, especially to those in whom he detects a similar interest in himself.