This part memoir and part musical biography of the American singer and drummer Karen Carpenter (1950-1983) documents why the Carpenter's seemingly white-washed music about 'normal love' have significance to the author, people of colour, immigrants, LGBTIQ and others. Tongson interweaves the story of her namesake’s rise to fame in the 1960's and '70s with the trans-Pacific journey of herself and her musicians family between her native Philippines - where imitations of American pop styles flourished - and Carpenter's Southern California, and between notions of romance and queer desires.