Obsessed with creating artificial human life, Professor Arthur Maxon travels with his daughter Virginia and his assistant Carl von Horn to a remote island in the East Indies, where a succession of grotesque experiments appears to culminate in Number Thirteen, a powerful and handsome man whom Maxon believes to be his perfected creation. Maxon’s fanatical plan for Virginia to marry his creation, von Horn’s desire to possess her himself, and the schemes of Muda Saffir and his pirates plunge the island into betrayal, kidnapping, and violence, while Number Thirteen, convinced that he is a soulless monster, repeatedly risks his life to protect Virginia and displays courage and compassion far greater than those around him. As Virginia comes to love the man others regard as unnatural, the truth behind Number Thirteen’s origins is finally revealed, turning the adventure into a larger question of whether humanity is determined by birth and physical creation or by love, conscience, sacrifice, and the choices a person makes.