Mem­oir tells the sto­ry of a girl whose fam­i­ly flees post WWII Roma­nia, and then as a 9 year-old is whisked away in the dead of night from her child­hood home in Haifa, Israel. Leav­ing behind her beloved grand­moth­er, the fam­i­ly immi­grates to Mon­tre­al, Cana­da, where she feels utter­ly lost. The new cul­ture of mul­ti­ple lan­guages, cus­toms and dom­i­nant reli­gions is dis­ori­ent­ing, as Ann strug­gles to adapt, fit in and find her­self. Her abil­i­ty to do so is com­pro­mised by her own emo­tion­al trau­ma and that of her par­ents, as well as the restric­tions placed on her by their minor­i­ty reli­gion and its place­ment in soci­ety. When she meets the love of her love, she learns that his fam­i­ly’s his­to­ry of dis­place­ment and sur­vival dur­ing the Holo­caust par­al­lels her own. As she matures, has chil­dren, and her ambi­tions grow, the author finds an inner strength. Even a shock­ing fam­i­ly secret learned late in life that might have shat­tered anoth­er’s world­view, only strength­ens her resolve to remain true to herself.