The author describes her pre-war London childhood of the 1930s: cranking up the Morris, Children's Hour on the radio, grandstand view of the wedding of the Duke of Kent and Princess Marina and the 1935 Silver Jubilee, and from her father's office on Trafalgar Square, the coronation in 1937. Hitler brought politics and chaos into her fairy tale childhood, beginning with boarding school in the Lake District, which was only the beginning of disruption of her life. The author describes the history of WWII through her family's experiences.