Coralie Sardie is the daughter of the sinister impresario behind The Museum of Extraordinary Things, a Coney Island boardwalk freak show that thrills the masses. An exceptional swimmer, Coralie appears as the Mermaid in her father’s “museum,” alongside performers like the Wolfman, the Butterfly Girl, and a one-hundred-year-old turtle.
One night, Coralie stumbles upon a striking young man taking pictures of moonlit trees in the woods off the Hudson River. This dashing photographer is Eddie Cohen, a Russian immigrant who has run away from his father’s Lower East Side Orthodox community and his job as a tailor’s apprentice.
When Eddie photographs the devastation on the streets of New York following the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, he becomes embroiled in the suspicious mystery behind a young woman’s disappearance, and ignites the heart of Coralie. In the tumultuous times that characterized life in New York between the world wars, Coralie and Eddie’s lives come crashing together in this mesmerizing, imaginative, and romantic tale.