In 1940, as the Nazis sweep toward Lithuania, Japanese diplomat Chiune Sugihara defies his own government and secretly issues thousands of visas to Jewish refugees desperate to flee. After the war, Sugihara is dismissed and disappears into obscurity.

Three decades later, in Australia, Rachel Margol, her father and her grandmother live disconnected from one another and haunted by unspoken tragedies. When Rachel announces her engagement to a Greek Orthodox man, it detonates a long-held secret. The Margols are actually the Margolins: they are Jewish, and her family has concealed their identity from her and the world. But why?

As Rachel struggles to understand this deception, an opportunity arrives to visit Chiune Sugihara, the man who risked his life to save them during World War II. Rachel becomes determined to meet him, but will a journey to Japan, and the secrets it uncovers, heal the Margolins or fracture them for good? An extraordinary novel inspired by the true story of Chiune Sugihara, and the thousands of people - including the author - who owe him their lives.