Mexico, 1985. Juan and Wilson, two perennial Veterinary students, perpetrate an audacious heist in the National Museum of Anthropology, running away with a loot of more than hundred invaluable pieces of Mayan art, unaware of the consequences of their outrageous act.
Summer in L.A., it's hot. Homeland Security has set the threat level at red; they're searching for several Arabs alleged to be terrorists. Mustafa, an Egyptian immigrant who runs a falafel shop, comes to the FBI's attention; they investigate him. He has other problems: his young teen son no longer wants to be a Muslim; his sister, a nurse, objects to Mustafa arranging her marriage to a cousin from Egypt. She has a non-Arab suitor of her own. Omar, an employee of Mustafa, is a struggling actor who doesn't want to play only terrorists. Mustafa hopes to open a real restaurant and has a potential partner in Sam, a Jew, whose family objects. What is the price of the American dream?
L.A. private eye Sam Black, who lives with his half-brother, Andrew, travels to the Bahamas to assist Abigail Marx, a woman who believes her husband is stealing money from their company.
Set against a political backdrop in Africa, the story spanning several years, unfolds around the powerful interaction between two women, their strong sexual allure, and their search to find meaning through it all.
