Set in 1949: one year in the childhood of Candida Lycett Green in the remote village of Farnborough in Berkshire. Here she lives with her father John Betjeman & her mother Penelope Chetwode in one of the bleakest & highest spots on the windswept downl&. Candida runs wild with the 'gang' of village children. Stimulated by regular excursions to the cinema in Wantage Candida & her best friend June became fascinated by the idea of love. Their romantic imagination is fuelled by the beautiful Ruby Mason who cleans the cottage of a reclusive scientist Dr. Fox employed at the neighbouring Harwell Atomic Research Centre. They stealthily engineer a romance between the two
- until it is revealed that none of the children's special adult friends are what they seem & the real world shockingly intervenes to overturn their innocence.