Published in 1998 by Henry Holt and Company, the novel is set in Petrolia, Ontario and Ottawa, Ontario and is narrated by Thomas MacMillan, a middle-aged black man re-telling the story of his mother's love affair with a man named Henry.
The novel was shortlisted for the 1998 Giller Prize, losing to Alice Munro's The Love of a Good Woman.
Born in 1957 Thomas is quickly abandoned by his mother and left to be raised by his alcoholic abusive grandmother in Petrolia, Ontario.
Thomas's mother, Katarina, first tells him they are going to Montreal but after a few days his mother's boyfriend abandons them by the side of the road in Manotick and they are forced to resettle in downtown Ottawa with Henry Wing, a chemist of Trinidadian and Chinese descent who is oppressively in love with Katarina.
Thomas decides not to live as Henry and his mother did and invites his lover, Marya, into his home for the first time.