[2] Beginning in 2008, the novel tells the story of two mixed-race, black and white, girls who meet in 1982 in a tap class in London.

Tracey credits this in part to the fact that her father is one of Michael Jackson's backup dancers, a lie she makes up to explain his prolonged absences.

In 1998 the narrator, newly graduated from college, is working at YTV, a music channel, and has a brief encounter with Aimee who comes to the station.

When the narrator is in her 30s, Aimee decides to build an all girls school in a rural village in an unspecified country in West Africa (implied to be Gambia).

Eventually she reunites with Tracey, who has a small part in a revival of Guys and Dolls and helps the narrator secure a position as a stagehand.

In retaliation Tracey sends her a confessional letter telling the narrator that she saw her father having sex with a black blowup doll he had dressed like a golliwog.

Back in London, the narrator discovers to her shock that Aimee has adopted Sankofa, the baby they met in West Africa, by somewhat illegal means.

Angry after being thrown out of her home and realizing that her entire life was attached to Aimee, the narrator sends the news of the illegal adoption to gossip rags.

Jeni Le Gon becomes an icon for the narrator and Tracey after they see her dancing in Ali Baba Goes to Town.

In another scene, the narrator is taken to see Chris Marker's 1983 documentary film Sans Soleil by her boyfriend Rakim.

[9] Ron Charles of The Washington Post dubbed it "a big social novel nimble enough to keep all its diverse parts moving gracefully toward a vision of what really matters in this life when the music stops.

[11] Sadiya Ansari writing for the Toronto Star had similar criticisms, disliking the narrator's tendency "to just float".