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Julia Franck, translated from the German by Anthea Bell
- 328 pages ;
This translation originally published: London: Harvill Secker, 2013. Awards: Long-listed for Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2014 (UK) Long-listed for I.M.P.A.C. Dublin Award 2015 (UK)
The moving story of a brother and a sister caught in the tide of the Cold War Kathe is a Jewish sculptor living in East Berlin. She barely acknowledges Ella's vulnerable loneliness and Thomas's quiet aspirations, and her hard-nosed brutality forces her children to build an imaginary world as a shelter from the coldness that surrounds them.