The story revisits the MS Saint Louis incident, where a ship carrying over 900 Jewish refugees was denied entry to Havana. Daniel Kaminsky, then a child, watched from the docks as his parents and sister were forced back to Europe and the Holocaust, despite their attempt to use the Rembrandt painting to bribe Cuban officials.
A lengthy historical section follows Elias Ambrosius, a young Sephardic Jew in Amsterdam who defies his community’s laws by becoming an apprentice to Rembrandt. He serves as the model for the Christ painting that becomes the focal point of the family saga.
The 17th-century "heretic" whose passion for art leads him to challenge religious dogma. Major Themes
It chronicles the long-term psychic costs of exile, loss of faith, and the struggle of Jewish refugees and contemporary Cubans to find their place in the world.