"The Willow's Bend" is the first title of the Chopin Trilogy. This novel introduces retired CIA officer Stanley Wisniewski, who is called in by a defense firm to investigate the drowning of one of their executives days before in the canals of Amsterdam. As Stanley takes up the investigation, he has a series of flashbacks to when he started his career and his father was dying of cancer. His father was attempting to tell him of how he survived his internment in the Auschwitz concentration camp during the Second World War. The two tales, of Stanley's investigation and his father's survival story are told in alternating chapters, and come together in the unexpected twist in the conclusion of the story.