Twenty-year-old Ismael Reyes is making a living in Miami as an impersonator of the rapper/singer Pitbull when he receives a cease-and-desist letter from the entertainer's lawyers. In search of a new ambition, Izzy decides to model his future on Tony Montana, the protagonist of the film Scarface, thus moving from one Cuban American cultural touchstone to another. He is squeamish about involving himself in the drug trade, so instead he (along with his friend Rudy, who he has chosen to be his sidekick) pursues a career smuggling migrants into the United States. There is a personal aspect to this shift, as Izzy himself came to America from Cuba at age seven on a raft with his mother, who drowned on the passage. Also, there's a whale who can influence Izzy's thoughts.

Izzy and Rudy bear a certain narrative resemblance to Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, but they are not held up to the reader'...