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Author: Erpenbeck, Jenny (Y), Hofmann, Michael

Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945)

Published on 11 April 2024 by GRANTA BOOKS in the United Kingdom.

Paperback | 304 pages
197 x 129 x 24 | 216g

WINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE 2024’An ambitious story of love and betrayal’ – Irish Times’The ending is like a bomb thrown into your room — you’ll be reeling for days and weeks to come.’ – Neel MukherjeeBerlin. 11 July 1986. They meet by chance on a bus. She is a young student, he is older and married. Theirs is an intense and sudden attraction, fuelled by a shared passion for music and art, and heightened by the secrecy they must maintain. But when she strays for a single night he cannot forgive her and a dangerous crack forms between them, opening up a space for cruelty, punishment and the exertion of power. And the world around them is changing too: as the GDR begins to crumble, so too do all the old certainties and the old loyalties, ushering in a new era whose great gains also involve profound loss.

From a prize-winning German writer, this is the intimate and devastating story of the path of two lovers through the ruins of a relationship, set against the backdrop of a seismic period in European history.