This is the story of a mother's attempts to regain her children. In 1984 Catherine Laylle, a Frenchwoman living in London, met and married a German medical student. The couple had two sons, and the family moved to Germany. Catherine subsequently returned to England with the boys, who spent the school holidays with their father in Germany - until the summer of 1994, when Catherine's husband had the custody ruling of a London court overturned in Germany, and the boys were taken from her.