Maryse Condé takes up the story of her life and invites us to accompany her on the exciting journey that marked her youth: a journey that begins in Paris, with an accidental pregnancy and the abandonment of the man she loves, and that leads her to wander through different African countries in search of that identity that was already beginning to glimpse with the discovery of blackness. Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea, Ghana and Senegal make up the polyhedral scene of the vital transformation of Maryse, who walks through the revolutionary circles of African socialism and surrenders to the fever of literary creativity while facing various disappointments in love, to the obstacles of unwanted motherhood and the emotional ravages of orphanhood.