Henry, a writer, receives a curious letter from an elderly taxidermist who wants Henry to help him write a play about a donkey and a howler monkey--Beatrice and Virgil--but Henry feel increasingly uncomfortable as he learns more about the odd world of the taxidermist and his perilous plans for Beatrice and Virgil.

A young Pi Patel, overcoming a cataclysmic shipwreck, finds himself stranded on a lifeboat with the only survivor, a ferocious Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.