Ivan Dolinar's life begins on April Fool's Day, 1948. As a boy growing up in a small town in Croatia, young Ivan lives in a world of propaganda and paranoia, and he quickly discovers that the best of intentions can backfire. At nineteen, full of hope and ambition, he enters medical school, but his medical career is cut short by a prank, and he is sent to a labour camp to dig rocks for two years. War breaks out soon after his release, and Ivan is drafted - into the wrong army. A pawn in an absurd conflict in which rules and loyalties shift unexpectedly, Ivan finds himself in a struggle simply to survive.