Like the characters in the popular dime novels of the time, London's heroes display such manly virtues as courage, loyalty, and steadfastness as they conftont the merciless frozen expanses of the north. Yet London breaks free of stereotypical figures and one-dimensional plots to explore deeper psychological and social questions of self-mastery, masculinity, and racial domination. The uneasy relationship between the Native Americans and whites lies...

The story of a lay community of mixed-up people encamped outside Imber Abbey, home of an enclosed order of nuns, including Dora Greenfield, an erring wife who returns to her husband, and Michael Meade, who is confronted by his homosexual former lover.