Flung into a 1963 Parisian school with no knowledge of French, a young Canadian girl is treated like the village idiot as she struggles to survive. Ill with late-diagnosed tuberculosis, she silently masters the language and forges some once-in-a-lifetime friendships. She also gets to know old world Paris, before the advent of tourists and big box stores: a city of strange odours, tiny shops, fierce gendarmes, quaint and sometimes infuriating customs.