It is the 1990s. Growing up in Zanzibar, three very different young people – Karim, Fauzia and Badar – are coming of age, and dreaming of great possibilities in their young nation. But for Badar, an uneducated servant boy who has never known his parents, it seems as if all doors are closed.
Central characters, like Selina, a former prostitute, and Gikere, a hospital assistant, return to their village with ambitions of wealth and power, neglecting the spiritual significance of the village pool. The pool, guarded by a mysterious old man, symbolizes the land's integrity and spiritual essence. As these characters pursue material gains, they disregard this spiritual core, leading to their downfall.

Selina's journey, marked by a conflict between her rural roots and urban disillusionment, ends in personal and communal tragedy. The novel critiques modernity's moral decay and the loss of spiritual connection, questioning whether the pool's sanctity ultimately prevails over such corruption.

The characters, who span a whole tapestry of rural Africa, are portrayed with a depth and richness that illuminates with shocking clarity aspects of rural society heretofore largely unexplored by African writers.