Characters
Raymond Dayan: The second oldest son in the Dayan family and our protagonist. Raymond has to be brave and strong during his turbulent youth, doing his best to keep his itinerant family together. Growing up, Father involves him in his schemes, but Raymond slowly learns how damaging they can be. Perhaps slightly naïve, throughout his life he struggles with wanting to love and respect his father, while being disgusted by his criminal behavior. As an adult, he shares some of Father’s traits – intelligent and resourceful, loves travelling, even speaks a number of languages. But unlike his father, he’s a straight shooter.
“Father” (Menachem Dayan): The patriarch. A proud, controlling man. An “old school” salesman. A small-time scam artist. Obsessed with proving that he’s smarter than everyone else. He constantly looks for new ways to earn more, devising simple yet ingenious, underhanded and often hilarious schemes. Father would be the perfect evildoer – that is, if he had no obligations. Unfortunately, he has seven children and a wife, which he drags with him from one country to another to stay one step ahead of the law. Stubborn and self-centered, at times even manipulating his own family members to get ahead.
David Dayan: The oldest sibling, who may have suffered the most at the hands of his parents, used as a pawn to try win an early release for Father from a Turkish prison. As an adult, David is cynical and harbors repressed anger towards both his parents. Recovering Father’s body in Tijuana and arranging the funeral brings back memories he’d rather forget.
“Mother” (Julia Dayan): A caring woman who falls under Father’s spell from a young age, she raises her seven children under trying circumstances and largely on her own (in various countries, even in the middle of a war zone). She tends to worry more about the neighbors’ gossip than the unstable nomadic life her family are forced to lead. Protective of her children, financially reliant on her crooked husband, and for many years, too cowardly to leave him.