Karo's dad is dead - or so she believes - and when a stranger comes to the door one day looking for her mum, Karo wants nothing to do with this man. But Karo's mother won't see sense. She starts to spend more and more time with this strange man from her past, and can't see how unhappy it is all making her daughter.

Karo squabbles with her friend, starts to skip school, she even runs away to her grandfather, but nothing she can do seems to have any effect on her changing family. Set in Hamburg after the fall of the Berlin Wall, this is a story of how international events can affect the everyday lives of ordinary families.