In the film, director Jörg Adolph documents the entire process of creating and marketing a novel - from the author's first pages of text to the publisher's advertising strategy. Over a period of 17 months, he accompanied the author John von Düffel and observed his work on the novel "Houwelandt". No step and no stage of the work is spared. You can see the intensive consultations with the editor as well as the meetings with the publisher and the reactions on the competitive book market.