Camila Boldsky

It is 1936, and at fifty-five years old, Camila Boldsky is lost. As she retires ownership of her factory and frets about her estranged son’s emigration to Chile, political tensions in Vienna only grow thicker. But despite being a Jew, Camila feels ambivalent about the need to escape—until she meets Sylvia Rittenschein, who is passionate in her fight against the Nazi menace. The two women are drawn to each other, and their quick friendship develops into something more.

At Sylvia’s urging, Camila is convinced to leave Vienna with her and start a new life in Cuba, but it is not so easy to leave behind their home and start anew. Although Camila settles into the unfamiliar country relatively well, Sylvia becomes restless, worried about the adult daughters she left behind. That worry spirals into an obsession that even Camila can’t alleviate, and she has no choice but to watch her lover take risks and return to Nazi-controlled Europe to retrieve her family.

Camila Boldsky explores how two women reconcile with the family that World War II had taken from them and reconstruct their lives in exile.