Content Warning: This section of the guide describes and discusses the source text’s depictions of police brutality, murder, and racism.

The novel opens with the narrator Michael’s recollection of his older brother Francis’s favorite place: the top of a hydro (utility) pole. Climbing the pole is dangerous because of the possibility of electrocution, but making it to the top safely gives one an amazing vantage point over the city and sky. Francis teaches Michael how to climb the pole safely by following in his footsteps.

Michael convinces his old friend Aisha to visit him after her father dies and she returns to Scarborough for the funeral. It is a setting heavy with memory, especially with the memory of Francis, who has been dead for 10 years.

The narrative flashes back in time to establish Michael’s family history and background. His mother, Ruth, is from Trinidad, and his father, who left the family when Michael and Francis were two and three years old, respectively, is also from the West Indies and of South Asian descent.