The stories in this book were written in the 1950s and 1970s.
«Who is circulating jokes?», «The mecca and the loner» are based on the life of the Estonian intelligentsia in the late 1930s, on the eve of the collapse of the bourgeois dictatorship and the establishment of Soviet power in Estonia. They give a vivid, occasionally ironical picture of te tense political situation of that period and the conflict of democratic art with the bourgeois regime which kowtowed to fascism.
«A summer painting» and «The girl in black» are set in the present day and deal with man as the main subject of art. Lilli Promet is a skilled writer of stories and fairy tales. Her prose is full of lyricism and love of her native land which for her is beautiful in all seasons.