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Kairos

By: Jenny Erpenbeck
Narrated by: Lisa Flanagan
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Summary

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 Mukherjee

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, fueled 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.
©2023 Jenny Erpenbeck (P)2023 New Directions Publishing Corp.
Literary Fiction Historical Fiction Women's Fiction
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Alright

I liked the beginning of the affair, the middle was repetitive and that ending that was supposed to be so jaw dropping I didn’t care about because the middle wasn’t great. The end

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The twist at the end.

I thought the description of life in East Berlin was very good and the contrast it gave to the West. The relationship was an unpleasant read but wasn’t bad writing. The twist was good. I was expecting it all to build into a crescendo with the wall coming down but it barely mentioned that.

The narration was good but I would have liked a German reading it in English. The accent would have made it more enjoyable for me.

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