After some prelimiary tourist escapades in Paris the central couple on their dream holiday arrives at a mill in the French countryside, not far from the Belgian border. In order not to be trapped with the erratic owner, they visit a memorial at Mardasson. It commemorates the Battle of the Bulge and the mystery that determines the path of their further wanderings uncoils before their eyes. Unexpectedly, evidence of unspoken truths from the past urge them on a treck that takes them across Germany and Poland. The book also encompasses a parallel narrative set in 1942 . It plots the path and the experiences of a young German boy, Bernd. At the tender age of seventeen his life undergoes a transformation. He brushes up against the Hitler Youth and the S.A. and he finally enlistis into the Kriegsmarine (U-boats). This exposes him to events that he could never have dreamt of. Stationed in remote Pillau he meets and falls for the bewitching Hanna The romance blooms amid the chaos of war until external forces separate them. And both of them separately are swept up up in the maelstrom that descends as the Reich unravels .......