Cora Stephan describes the lives of two European families from the early 20th century to the end of World War II, when an entire world had been reduced to dust and rubble.
They were a rare and odd pair of friends at Cambridge University: the aristocratic Scotsman Liam Broedie and Alard von Sedlitz, a landowner’s son from Upper Silesia. Their fathers had studied together in Heidelberg and remained friends for life, even though World War I made wartime enemies of them. And their sons continue this family friendship against all odds.
At the beginning of the century, Alard experiences a carefree childhood and youth in the rural idyll of Upper Silesia – despite the catastrophe of World War I and its aftermath. At the same time, across the sea, Liam grows up as a member of an ancient Scottish clan with its best days behind it, yet which still nurses its old animosity against the English crown.
Inspired by their great affection for each other, Alard and Liam conspire to attempt the impossible: namely, to stop the course of the impending human catastrophe and to overcome the hostility between their countries in World War II. Alard works for the Foreign Office in Berlin, Liam on behalf of the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS). But, while they may be able to save individuals like the German-Jewish photographer Helene during the Spanish Civil War, they are unable to avert the horror they see looming on the world’s horizon.
