Nurdin Lalani and his family, Asian immigrants from Africa, have come to the Toronto suburb of Don Mills only to find that the old world and its values pursue them. A genial orderly at a downtown hospital, he has been accused of sexually assaulting a girl. Although he is innocent, traditional propriety prompts him to question the purity of his own thoughts. Ultimately, his friendship with the enlightened Sushila offers him an alluring freedom from a past that haunts him, a marriage that has become routine, and from the trials of coping with teenage children. Introducing us to a cast of vividly drawn characters within this immigrant community, Vassanji is a keen observer of lives caught between one world and another.

M.G. Vassanji was born in Kenya and raised in Tanzania. He attended university in the United States, where he trained as a nuclear physicist, before coming to Canada in 1978. Vassanji is the author of six novels and two collections of short stories. His work has appeared in various countries and several languages, and he has twice won the Giller Prize. His most recent novel, The Assassin’s Song, was shortlisted for both the Giller Prize and the Governor-General’s Award. He is a member of the Order of Canada and lives in Toronto.

M.G. Vassanji's profile page

"A novel of considerable charm and intelligence, informed by a delightful sense of irony." —Mordecai Richler

"Vassanji probes beneath the surface to create a compelling and poignant portrait of human displacement." —Ottawa Citizen

"It is part of Vassanji's great talent to demonstrate that the minor changes—unexpected love, sex, accusations—in the life of a very modest man are, in fact, transformations of history." —Globe and Mail

"Vassanji, in charting a tiny part of the Canadian reality, offers up certain truths, thought-provoking, disturbing, but ultimately, and in a small way, hopeful." —Saturday Night