It's 1958 and eleven-year-old Peter Wolf lives in the war-rubble squalor of East Germany which is ruled with an iron fist by the Soviet Communists. People stand in long lines to buy rancid meat, water pails are kept on toilet lids to prevent sewer rats from invading apartments and, worst of all, every citizen is encouraged to spy upon every other citizen and report any suspect behavior to the hated Stassi (Secret Police).
Risking their lives escaping East Germany, surviving a kidnapping attempt, enduring six long months in a refugee camp and crossing the Atlantic in steerage, Peter discovers America is not the paradise he had envisioned.