In Alina Bronsky's new novel "Barbara Doesn't Die" an older man finds his wife after 52 years of marriage one morning not next to him in bed or downstairs in the kitchen making coffee, but with a bleeding head on the bathroom floor. And in the story "The Gift", Peter, a little younger than Walter, goes to the north Hessian province over Christmas with his wife Kathrin to meet Klaus there again. When the children were still small, they did a lot, a lot, a lot with Klaus and Almut and their two children of the same age, then it became quiet in this friendship, Almut recently died. In the dutiful expectation of helping a grieving widower over the festive season, the two finally stand in front of a cheerful man - and in front of a young woman, Sharon, who turns out to be his new girlfriend.
Andrea Diener
Editor in the features section.
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Fridtjof Küchemann
Editor in the features section.
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The first book ends at Christmas, the second takes place entirely on Christmas days.
The author does not even call herself "Christmassy socialized".
A conversation with Alina Bronsky about abysses and old men, about decelerated writing and stories that grow best when you don't watch them.
“The Gift” by Alina Bronsky was published in the Chrismon Edition of the Evangelical Publishing House, has 128 pages and costs 12 euros. “Barbara does not die” was published by Kiepenheuer & Witsch, has 256 pages and costs 20 euros.
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