Come a Stranger

The Tillermans again - although from a different angle and not for some time. Mina is a lovely, strong black character and prejudice is a, not always obvious, strand to the story. More clearly this is about people and relationships: strong characters, standing up for themselves and standing out against unfairness. The early part has Mina's failure during a second year at an all-white summer dance school. She is rejected for her ungainliness and made to feel it as a racial failure. Tamer Shipp, a Harlem priest who swaps with her father for a summer break, helps her to face this and her earlier rejection of friends and all things black in favour of white, classical culture. Her love for the married man is handled well by being acknowledged as more than just a fantasy. From here the links with earlier books begin to proliferate as we are reminded first of The Runner, meet Dicey, in Mina's class, and then the rest of the family. There's reconciliation and a laying to rest of earlier griefs (both for this book and the others), and a brave, but measured looking ahead.