Can you escape your destiny? The one chosen for you? asks Esther Vital. A Moroccan Jew born in Strasbourg, crushed by the weight of tradition and family, but also torn by nostalgia for abandoned paradises – Spain from Cordoba to Toledo, Morocco from Mogador to Fez – Esther tries to find out who she is, in the illusion of freedom.
When she chooses love as an escape, everything she thought she’d escaped catches up with her. On the eve of her wedding, dressed in the purple dress of Sephardic promises, Esther discovers the evil eye and the terrible secret that marks her… Through this quest for her origins, Eliette Abécassis explores with emotion and erudition the history of Moroccan Jews, from the Inquisition to the present day, their rivalries, their culture and their beliefs. This is the great novel of the Sephardic world.
