Jenny Erpenbeck

One of the great contemporary European writers takes on Europe's biggest issue. Richard has spent his life as a university professor, immersed in the world of books and ideas. But now he is retired, his books remain in their packing boxes, and he steps into the streets of his city, Berlin. Here, on Alexanderplatz, he discovers a new community—a tent...

Berlin. 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...

Winner of the 2015 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize From one of the most daring voices in European fiction, this is a story of the twentieth century traced through the various possible lives of one woman. She is a baby who barely suffocates in the cradle. Or perhaps not? She lives to become an adult and dies beloved. Or dies betrayed....

Richard has spent his life as a university professor, immersed in the world of books and ideas. But now he is retired, his books remain in their packing boxes, and he steps into the streets of his city, Berlin. Here, on Oranienplatz, he discovers a new community—a tent city established by African asylum seekers. Hesitantly, getting to know the new...

In this fascinating collection, Jenny Erpenbeck meditates on the disappearance and impermanence of things. Whether recalling the demolition of familiar places, the loss of a friendship, or a change in social attitudes, Erpenbeck's sharp intelligence, eye for telling detail, and her nuanced perspective on her country's history and her own writing lifeimbue these short pieces with lasting power.

Who are we when we are born? Who are we when the hour of our death comes? What changes? What remains? By tracing the five possible lives lived and the five deaths of one woman whose life spans, or fails to span, the twentieth century, the magical, magisterial author of Visitation exposes the machinations of what we call "fate" –...

Not a Novel gathers together the best of Jenny Erpenbeck's non-fiction. Drawing from her 25 years of thinking and writing, the book plots a journey through the works and subjects that have inspired and influenced her. Written with the same clarity and insight that characterise her fiction, the pieces range from literary criticism and reflections on Germany's history, to the...

Shortlisted for the 2011 Independent Foreign Fiction Prize By the side of a lake in Brandenburg, a young architect builds the house of his dreams – a summerhouse with wrought-iron balconies, stained-glass windows the colour of jewels, and a bedroom with a hidden closet, all set within a beautiful garden. But the land on which he builds has a dark...

By the side of a lake in Brandenburg, a young architect builds the house of his dreams - a summerhouse with wrought-iron balconies, stained-glass windows the colour of jewels, and a bedroom with a hidden closet, all set within a beautiful garden. But the land on which he builds has a dark history of violence that began with the drowning...

Berlin. 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...