In 1933 on a German luxury liner sailing from Mexico to Germany, the separate but interlocking stories of the various passengers begins to unfold. Among the many passengers is a divorcee desperate for love and lost youth, a Spanish noblewoman being deported as a political prisoner, an aging alcoholic ballplayer, and a budding Nazi whose brutishness foreshadows the holocaust to come.

1629: A newly orphaned young girl named Mayken is bound for the Dutch East Indies on the Batavia, one of the greatest ships of the Dutch Golden Age. Curious and mischievous, Mayken spends the long journey going on misadventures above and below the deck, searching for a mythical monster. But the true monsters might be closer than she thinks. 1989: A lonely boy named Gil is sent to live off the coast of Western Australia among the seasonal fishing community...