This book is told in two different timelines, and at first they don’t seem to connect. The stories are interesting on their own, but I struggled to see how the years between them fit together. Maybe that was intentional—maybe we aren’t supposed to know everything that happened. Still, I found myself wanting more answers, especially about the rituals that survived without much explanation.
The first timeline takes place in 1492 and follows Luis de Torres as he flees the Spanish Inquisition. Although his family has publicly converted to Christianity, they secretly continue practicing Judaism as “Conversos.” As danger grows in Portugal and the risk of being exposed increases, Luis leaves his family behind. He joins Christopher Columbus’s voyage as an interpreter, hoping to find a safe new home where his family can eventually join him.
The second timeline is set in 1992 in Entrada de la Luna, New Mexico. Miguel Torres is a teenager who loves the stars but lives in a town with little opportunity. Nearly everyone in the community is either a Torres or a Roybal, or both. Vincente Roybal, who owns the town store, has spent decades building a family tree to understand why. When Miguel visits the store for supplies—sometimes buying them, sometimes receiving them as gifts from the kind‑hearted Roybal—he notices an ad for a nanny job. At just 15, he calls the number and is hired by Rachel Rothstein, a newcomer to town.
As Miguel works for Rachel, he begins to recognize rituals, like Friday night Shabbat dinners, that feel familiar to his own family’s traditions. After one of the boys he watches is injured, Rachel finds Miguel at his favorite stargazing spot—the old town cemetery, where he uses a telescope given to him by his world‑traveling aunt. There, Rachel notices that many of the headstones are written in Hebrew. This discovery leads the town to uncover its hidden Jewish roots, much like many other families descended from Conversos.
The Source 4 Books 