15-year-old Maren lives alone with her mom. Her dad left the family and he now lives in Nepal, writing spiritual books, as her mother says. But Maren discovers the truth. Her father does not live in Nepal. He lives nearby. As a woman.

Both sullen and sweet, childish and wise, Maren is your typical everyday paradox called teenage girl. Her mother sucks. Her mother's boyfriend sucks. Everything sucks. Then she hears that her dad, Bernd, really isn't in Nepal "finding" himself, but has already found himself - in a gray Cologne suburb. In the five years since Maren last saw Bernd, he's become a transsexual named Sophia, a bourgeois suburban housewife living in a tasteless house with an aged widower. Maren feels like she's been struck by lightning. Though it really, really sucks, she feels it's time to pay Sophia a visit. Any lingering visions of sequined drag queens are dispelled when she meets Sophia, who hates to attract attention, even though her maleness is clearly evident. Maren, who'd need a father in these difficult years and who's got enough of one mother, now finds herself with no dad and two mothers. Getting used to this situation is a tall order for a teen, whose visit will entail guilt and disappointment, but perhaps also understanding and even love.