Danny is a 12 year old boy who lives alone with his mother. After she becomes seriously ill, he ends up at a children's home where there is an environment of physical and sexual abuse. He absconds and sets off to find his mother, whom he believes is now living somewhere in the North of England. One night to shelter from the weather, he stows away on Jennifer Jo, a canal narrowboat belonging to Alex, a retired schoolteacher, but now a widowed live-aboard boater who spends his time cruising the inland waterways network. Rather than turn Danny in to the authorities, Alex reluctantly decides to allow the scared and frightened boy to stay with him on his boat and they set off together on what Alex believes to be a fruitless search for Danny's mother. Set against the background of modern-day life on the canals, this thoughtful and sensitively-written book tells how Alex works to win the boy's trust, and how over the months and years that follow they find his mother and work together to bring the abusers to justice.