When Eli de Villiers, a boy from a fractured family in Cape Town, goes to India with his mother, an astonishing adventure awaits him. He is kidnapped and lands in a brothel in Delhi, at the mercy of the diabolical madam and child trafficker, Auntie Lakshmi.

Eli escapes with other children, fleeing through India's fantastical landscapes towards Nepal - Eli to find his father, the others to return home. In hot pursuit are Lakshmi's henchmen, as well as her nemesis, the irrepressible Inspector V.J. Gupta.

A band of Maoist rebels, enlisted by Eli's father to help find his son, follows their trail.

In this evocative coming-of-age saga, a boy's quest to reunite his family collides with the bittersweet realisation that he cannot remain in the garden of dreams forever, and that a broader, bolder life is impossible without accepting the world as an imperfect place.