Set in the Gold Coast of Africa in the ten years leading up to its independence , Cloth Girl vividly captures the colours, customs and class divides of that country in the 1940s through the stories of two very different women.
Audrey, white and twenty-three, has just moved from England to be with her new husband, Alex, a senior civil servant. In search of adventure she thought she would love her new home but finds herself overwhelmed by the heat, irritated with the servants and disdainful of her fellow ex-pats. Having failed miserably in her attempts “to fit in” and bored all day long with nothing to do she becomes angry and resentful and starts to drink heavily.