Summary

Part I, “Falling,” takes place in New York City in 1985 and is told from the perspective of Anita, an artist originally from Cuba and now living in New York. Anita recalls the events of a party at the home of the art dealer Tilly Barber and observes that, if it were not for the events that happened later in the night, no one would remember anything about this party. Anita watched her husband, the famous modernist artist Jack Martin, arrive at the party and go to greet Tilly before acknowledging her. Anita followed Jack into the kitchen to tell him some news: that she had sold some prints of her art to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and that she was going to have her first solo exhibition in Rome. In the narration...