After the massacre by Biafran soldiers in her native Cameroonian village , Anwei and her childhood sweetheart escape to Douala. She is left behind while, Jason, selected by accident, goes to England to study. An affair with an expatriate forester leaves her, ignorant of the seed he has planted. Anwei is rejected by her village for having a matis (mixed race) baby, Charles, and nearly dies on the road back to Douala. He is adopted in a dramatic scene by his natural father and his English bride. Charles is educated in England to the level of first MB medical degree but in his gap year takes a trip with Medicins sans Frontieres to the Congo region. A coincidence is the grounds for an expedition into the Congo jungle to claim her birthright and extreme wealth from minerals with the aid of her returned son, and a band of well drawn misfits including a Catholic missionary escaping child abuse in Ireland, a naïve Australian female journalist, some Cape Coloured fishermen, and a colony of lepers. Brimming with emotional and sexual encounters and violent conflicts, this African story is a truly exotic human experience with well constructed and exciting plotlines.