Diary for My Children tells the story of Juli, an orphan who returns home with her grandparents after living in the Soviet Union in the late 1940s.
Her aunt, Magda, a prison director, tries to indoctrinate Juli with blind faith in communism, but Juli remains stubborn and resistant.
Juli recalls her father's arrest by the KGB and her mother's death, realizing that the Soviet terror is still present in Hungary.
As Juli grows older, she investigates her parents' past with the help of Magda's brother, Janos, and comes to understand her father through him.