American Subversive tells the tale of Aidan Cole, a New York-based failed journalism student turned Manhattan gossip blogger and Paige Roderick, a "home-grown" eco-terrorist turned radical by the Iraq War death of her beloved brother. The novel explores the roots of radicalism in the modern world and it is structured as a split memoir, alternating between the points of view of the two characters, who are now hiding in separate safe houses, following a radical action that went terribly wrong.