Tent of Miracles was written three years after the military overthrew Brazilian democracy, and it is part of a series Amado called "The Bahia Novels", works exploring the region's past.

The novel chronicles the chaos that results when a prominent Columbia University professor arrives in Brazil, with nothing but praise on his lips for a long-forgotten local Bahian writer and self-taught social scientist named Pedro Archanjo.

When a few people finally uncover who Arcanjo was and what he espoused, media barons and advertisers are horrified to discover that he was an Afro-Brazilian social critic, womanizer and heavy drinker who died penniless in the gutter.

The historical setting is the colorful old Pelourinho neighborhood of Salvador, Bahia, that flows down the hill from the main plaza, where Archanjo works as a lowly runner at the School of Medicine adjacent to the cathedral.

The womanizing of the hero serves to highlight the belief of both Pedro Archanjo and the novel's author that uninhibited sexual passion between people of different races and colors (and the resulting mixed children) is Brazil's unique solution to racism.