Nazi Brownshirts drag Josef's father from the family apartment on Kristallnacht and send him to Dachau concentration camp.

Josef's father is released from Dachau and the Landau family boards the MS St. Louis bound for Cuba.

Isabel's father is beaten by police during a Havana food riot, forcing the family to plan an immediate escape from Cuba.

A missile tears out the entire front wall of Mahmoud's apartment building in Aleppo, Syria.

Mahmoud's father decides the family must leave Syria immediately and begins driving toward the Turkish border.

Isabel's family and their neighbors launch a makeshift boat from a Cuban beach as police fire bullets after them.

Josef's bar mitzvah ceremony takes place aboard the MS St. Louis while his father refuses to leave the cabin.

Cuban authorities repeatedly deny the MS St. Louis permission to dock in Havana Harbor, promising entry only tomorrow.

Mahmoud's rubber dinghy crashes near Greece and he hands baby Hana to a stranger on a passing boat to save her from drowning.

Josef's father escapes the ship's cabin and throws himself overboard outside Havana Harbor.

Iván is attacked and killed by a shark while floating alongside Isabel's boat near the Florida coast.

The MS St. Louis is ordered to leave Cuban waters and Josef learns his father must stay behind in Havana.

Mahmoud leads a march of refugees out of a Hungarian detention center toward the Austrian border.

A Nazi soldier forces Josef's mother to choose which child to free; Josef volunteers himself so Ruthie can escape.

Mahmoud's family is taken in by Ruth Rosenberg in Germany, who reveals she is Josef's sister, saved by his sacrifice.

These events trace the most critical turning points across all three refugee storylines from beginning to end. Josef's journey begins when Nazis arrest his father and ends with the devastating revelation that he sacrificed himself for his sister Ruthie. Isabel's story moves from her father's beating by police to the launch of their fragile boat, the loss of her friend Iván, and finally the desperate sprint to American soil. Mahmoud's path takes him from his bombed apartment in Aleppo through a harrowing sea crossing and a refugee detention center to ultimately finding a home with Josef's surviving sister in Germany. Together these events show how political violence forces ordinary families into impossible circumstances across different eras. The novel's most powerful moments—Josef's sacrifice, Mahmoud's march, and Ruth Rosenberg's revelation—are all captured in this pool.

The core refugee journeys from persecution to resolution.

Isabel plays her trumpet on the streets of Havana hoping to earn money during Cuba's severe food shortage.

Josef removes his Star of David armband on the train to Hamburg and is caught and warned by a Hitler Youth.

Castro announces that Cubans may leave freely, and Isabel's family makes plans to use the Castillo family's homemade boat.

Isabel trades her beloved trumpet to a fisherman in exchange for enough gasoline to reach Miami.

Mahmoud and his family flee on foot after rebel soldiers draw gunfire toward their car and the vehicle is destroyed.

Josef overhears two ship crew members worrying that Cuba may refuse to let the MS St. Louis passengers disembark.

Mahmoud's family crosses the Turkish border into a refugee tent city and learns of a smuggler who can get them to Greece.

Mahmoud's family waits in Izmir for days as the promised boat never arrives, forcing them to sleep in an abandoned shopping mall.

Josef's father leaves his ship cabin for the first time to attend a funeral service for a fellow passenger.

An oil tanker nearly collides with Isabel's stalled boat at night; Señor Castillo falls overboard and Isabel dives in to save him.

Nazi crew members trash Josef's family's cabin and threaten to have his father sent back to a concentration camp.

Isabel's storm-battered boat is blown off course and reaches the Bahamas, where local police deny them permission to come ashore.

Ten male passengers recruit Josef to help seize the MS St. Louis's bridge, but the captain talks the mutineers into standing down.

Belgium, the Netherlands, France, and England agree to accept the MS St. Louis passengers and Josef's family is assigned to France.

Isabel settles in Miami, receives a new trumpet, and plays the national anthem in salsa style, finally hearing the clave beat.

These events fill in the texture of daily survival between each story's major crises. Isabel's identity as a musician is established early through her trumpet, which she ultimately trades away to fund the family's escape, and her arc closes when she finally rediscovers her music in Miami. Josef's vulnerability is shown when he is caught by a Hitler Youth on the train and later when he overhears the crew's warnings about Cuba being turned away. Mahmoud's long weeks of waiting in Turkey reveal how refugee journeys are defined as much by exhausting delays as by dramatic crises. Secondary incidents—the funeral aboard the MS St. Louis, the near-collision with a tanker, the Bahamas stopover, and the failed mutiny—build a rich picture of the smaller struggles within each larger journey. Together these events show that the path to safety is rarely a single dramatic moment but a relentless accumulation of obstacles and small choices.

The hidden struggles and secondary moments along each refugee's path.

Mahmoud lives in war-torn Aleppo by practicing deliberate invisibility, keeping his head down to avoid soldiers, rebels, and bullies.

Josef's family reunites with his father at the Hamburg docks, revealing how Dachau has left the man broken and terrified.

Isabel's grandfather argues that leaving Cuba will cause Isabel to lose her identity forever, but Isabel refuses to turn back.

Josef slaps his panicking father during the Cuban medical inspection and realizes he has become the adult of the family.

Mahmoud's family boards a rubber dinghy with thirty strangers for a dangerous nighttime crossing toward the Greek island of Lesbos.

Josef's mother accidentally takes the sleeping draught she obtained for his father, leaving Josef alone to watch over everyone.

Mahmoud retrieves a life jacket from a dead man floating in the sea and uses it to keep his exhausted mother afloat.

The Greek Coast Guard rescues Mahmoud and his mother and reunites them with his father and brother, but Hana is gone.

Mahmoud's mother frantically searches every refugee camp on the island of Lesbos for baby Hana but finds no trace of her.

A taxi driver holds Mahmoud's family at gunpoint on a dark highway, demanding their money before they can reach Hungary.

Mahmoud is shot with tear gas while storming the barbed wire fence at the Hungarian border with other desperate refugees.

Hungarian detention center guards club Mahmoud's father for resisting, and Mahmoud instinctively tries to turn invisible and avoid notice.

Isabel's grandfather confesses to his family that he was one of the police officers who turned the MS St. Louis away.

Isabel's mother goes into labor in the boat just as the passengers approach the shore of Miami Beach.

Mahmoud's exhausted refugee march crosses into Austria and is surrounded by cheering locals who offer food and warm welcomes.

This pool captures the moments of internal change and sudden revelation that define each character's coming-of-age across the three storylines. Josef's loss of innocence is traced through his slap of his panicking father during the health inspection and the moment his mother accidentally takes the sleeping draught, leaving him alone to protect his family. Mahmoud's evolution from invisible to visible is documented through a series of turning points, from boarding the dangerous dinghy to Greece to his final decision to draw the attention of a UN inspector inside the Hungarian detention center. Isabel's arc is shaped by her grandfather's argument about identity, his hidden guilt over the MS St. Louis, and his ultimate act of sacrifice to save his family. The revelations in this pool—about lost children, buried pasts, and the cost of survival—connect all three stories across generations. Together they show that true coming-of-age is not a ceremony but a choice made under impossible pressure.

The pivotal decisions and revelations that define each character's transformation.