Four women speak. They speak to the same man. He is the son of the first, the great-yet-impossible love of the second, the platonic companion of the third, the older brother of the last. Speaking to him in his absence, it is to themselves that these women turn, examining their own stories to make sense of their journey, from twilight to twilight, through a mysterious stormy night in the middle of the dry season.

These voices perform a powerful and sometimes discordant jazz-inspired chorus about issues such as the intrusion of history into the intimate lives of people, the experience of people of African descent, femininity, sexuality, and self-love. Blackness confronts African-ness, love is sometimes discovered in the arms of another woman, the African renaissance tries to establish itself on the rubble of a self-esteem damaged by history.

Each of these women, with her own language and rhythm, ultimately represents a specific aspect of the tormented history of the people of African descent in today's world, and at the end of the night they will each arrive at a dawn of hope and completeness.

From the author of the critically acclaimed Season of the Shadow comes Twilight of Torment: Melancholy, the first of a two-volume novel of unparalleled power and sensuality.