On September 29, 1939, nineteen-year-old Josef Kavalier is hidden inside the Golem of Prague and smuggled out of Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia in a crate bound for Lithuania, trained in escapology by the magician Kornblum. His escape across Europe to New York is the event that sets Chabon's novel in motion — one man's literal flight from history that will haunt him for the rest of his life.