It may not be as simple as two strangers sitting on a park bench in Paris on a sunny afternoon in the spring of 1975 when a handsome young man asked a red-haired woman: "Vous-etes au pair?" Two foreigners in Paris. What begins as a tentative exchange soon develops into an affair. When Amy and her son travel to Tunisia for the summer, Habib mysteriously appears. The Jasmine Man is a deeply considered novel that addresses issues of art, culture and colonialism as it explores the realms of memory and desire. With compassion and wit, Tostevin charts the repercussions of this affair, ultimately subverting the conventions of traditional novels of passion. Amy's relationship with Habib is one of self-discovery, and she is forced to make difficult decisions about her future.