Mark Smith, is a sensitive thirty-seven-year-old environmental scientist of mixed race. He tries to come to terms with his mother’s painful death as he goes through the stages of grief. Mark is also reassessing his relationship with his gay twin sister, Maria, a lawyer. After several failed relationships with women in college, Mark, while at his mother’s funeral in Chicago, reconnects with his high school girlfriend, Christy, an artist who paints only self-portraits. He now believes he has finally found true and lasting love, but trouble is brewing. Pulling focus on the cumulative unease and random violence that has gripped American life in recent years, The Glint of Light proves why Clarence Major is one of America’s most beloved novelists.