When Norman, a young American lands up in Tangier, he little realises that his affair with Alice, a woman of a certain age, will end in tragedy. His quest takes him back to New York and then again to Morocco, where he falls in love with Miss Toledano, a crippled Moraccan Jewess. Hopkin's richly evocative novel culminates in a dersert scene worthy of Paul Boweles's 'The Sheltering Sky'.