Paris, July 1942: Sarah, a ten year-old girl, is arrested with her family by the French police in the Vel dHiv roundup, but not before she locks her younger brother in a cupboard in the familys apartment, thinking that she will be back within a few hours. Paris, May 2002: On Vel dHivs 60th anniversary, journalist Julia Jarmond is asked to write an article about this black day in Frances past. Through her contemporary investigation, she stumbles onto a trail of long-hidden family secrets that connect her to Sarah. Julia finds herself compelled to retrace the girls ordeal, from that terrible term in the Vel dHiv, to the camps, and beyond. As she probes into Sarahs past, she begins to question her own place in France, and to re-evaluate her marriage and her life. Tatiana de Rosnay offers us a brilliantly subtle, compelling portrait of France under occupation and reveals the taboos and silence that surround this painful episode.