The novel Daddy is a historical fiction/thriller takes place during World War II. Because this book is more of a thriller than a historical novel, the author's purpose in writing this book is to entertain the reader rather than educate them, although he ended up doing so in the process.
Hans Thomas von Gall is an elderly German banker, who has fooled the Nazi's.
He has hidden the sum of 724 million marcs (approx. 431 million dollars) of German investor's money, some Jewish, out of the country before the start of World War II.
After being captured and tortured by the Nazi's for ten hours, he committed suicide by jumping out of a window, but not before writing down 724 false names and access codes.
Heydrich, leader of the operation, has reason to believe that Thomas Von Gall is not the only one who knew the secret codes. He believes that Thomas Von Gall's beautiful mysterious granddaughter also holds the secret. .
Heydrich enlists the help of two different types of man hunters to help him find her. His friend, Professor Gregor Laemmle, who is a cunning yet odd homosexual, and a vicious, boneheaded nazi, named Jurgen Hess who is willing to kill anything that moves. Maria Webber was able to elude them expertly. Although they were not able to find her, Laemmle discovered that she has an eleven-year-old son. His name is Thomas and he is a kid genius, (the nazi's do not know this). He is hiding in the countryside of Basque, while being protected by expert Spaniard bodyguards. Laemmle and Hess make attempts to capture Thomas in hopes of using him as bait to reach his mother, but Thomas engages Laemmle in a battle of brains running around all over the south of France. Thomas is a grown man in a little boy's body and refuses to trust anybody. This game of cat and mouse takes the form of a giant game of chess in his head, where he sacrifices loved ones to avoid being captured.
At one point in this story, Thomas is captured by Laemmle, (who had fallen in love with both the boy and the women he has never met) and was used to lure his mother into a trap.