Vivid and candid, this historical novel chronicles the lives of three families over the course of 50 years during the Cold War and its aftermath. The experiences of each family—one British, one Hungarian, and one Russian—reflect the brutality, danger, bravery, heartbreak, hope, and disappointment during the days when the world was divided by the Iron Curtain. This account skillfully portrays how world events—including the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, the Solidarity movement in Poland in the early 1980s, and the end of Communism in Eastern Europe in 1989 and in the Soviet Union in 1991—affected the lives of the four children and their families in their respective countries.