The novel’s protagonist, Paloma, is a 12-year-old girl from Kansas. She is passionate about mystery novels featuring the fictional detective Lulu Pennywhistle, demonstrating her keen thinking skills and penchant for a mental challenge; this metafictional detail also anticipates her role as a detective figure in this novel. Paloma is a friendly and social pre-teen who enjoys the company of her friends and is therefore reluctant to spend a month away from them while she travels to Mexico with her mother.

Paloma’s life is defined by the absence of her father, who was killed in an accident when Paloma was a toddler. She hungrily takes in any anecdote about him that her mother offers, driven to gain a sense of the person he was. These glimpses of her father are so important to her that Paloma writes them down and saves them—along with other objects representing him—in a special box. This establishes the novel’s exploration of Discovering Familial Heritage.

Paloma quickly falls in love with Mexico, however, and all aspects of its culture. Though she is hesitant to prove her mother right, Paloma embraces the opportunity to draw closer to her father by learning about her own Mexican heritage.