In the waning months of 1956, while Russian tanks roll into the public squares of Budapest to crush the Hungarian Revolution, brothers Robert and Attila Beck flee with their family to the Paris townhouse of their great-aunt Hermina. As they travel through minefields both real and imagined, Robert and Attila grapple with sibling rivalry, family secrets, and incalculable loss to arrive at a place they thought they’d lost forever: home.

In beautifully crafted writing that burns with intensity and humour, Joseph Kertes explores displacement and uncertainty in a dark time from the perspective of two boys filled with wonder at the world around them.