It is the 1950s, in Hungary, when Stalinist repression has reduced the populace to silence and deception. The narrator, a young boy, lives alone with his grandparents. His rebellious, talkative grandfather, refusing to submit to the implacable realities, flees to his memories of the past, in which he believes he can still find redemption, and for his grandson, he weaves a fantastic tapestry of stories of family sagas.

His myths and legends depict the luxuriant history of a family with both Christian and Jewish roots, and of a people who, having denied the Messiah, must legitimate their faith and expiate their sins over thousands of years. And, as he talks, he teaches the boy that, however wild and wondrous the stories may seem, every sentence in them is "a unit of truth.".

Simultaneously, another terrible story is engaging both the storyteller and the boy. Together they realize that the boy's father, a government official, has betrayed his family and friends, and is now being named a traitor by the authorities. Liberated into sincerity and freedom by his grandfather's stories, the boy gives dark and passionate testimony to the alienation and treason of a sinister adult world. And finally we see how his family story will end.