Julian Treslove and Sam Finkler have known each other since childhood, while Libor Sevcik was once their history teacher. Over the years, life has taken them in different directions, though they have never entirely lost touch. The deaths of Finkler's wife and Libor's wife bring the three men together once again. Treslove, an honorary widower, spends a few bittersweet hours with his two friends reminiscing about the past.
But that same evening, as he walks home with a heavy heart, he becomes the victim of what appears to be a routine mugging—an incident he spends days trying to make sense of. Gradually, one conviction takes hold: his attacker mistook him for a Jew. But what if he really were one?