With the same central characters who appeared in The Meeting Point (1972) Mr. Clarke returns to Toronto with a second, deceptively sprightly -- at times -- merry-go-round of the ups and downs and ins and outs of that cold Canadian city's appealing "Wessindian" population -- domestics sassing their white bosses in traditional accepted fashion (throwing parties, "borrowing" liquor and occasionally straying husbands) -- their own out-of-work spouses forever searching for that job that is something better than janitor -- and apparently, meanwhile, having the time of their lives. Of course, every silver lining has its cloud -- the difficulties of being an emigrant, disagreeable landladies and ugly cops (though a far cry from their U.S. cousins), the deep-down hatred underlying even the best interracial marriages -- implicit but never discussed (or solved, pseudo-philosophical-wise) by this apparently superficial but actually extremely sophisticated author, who trusts his reader to see the undercoating of his unfailingly energized dialogue. It keeps the novel articulate and alive.

Preceded by The meeting point. Followed by The bigger light.