Five-year-old Vera has fled from East Prussia to the North German region Old Country with her mother in 1945. They find refuge in an old farmhouse. But for the whole of her life Vera has never felt at home in the big, chilly house, yet she cannot bring herself to abandon it. Then, sixty years later, her niece, Anne, suddenly appears at her front door. She has fled with her little son from a suburb in Hamburg, where ambitious wholefood parents carry their kids through the streets like trophies – and where Anne's husband loves another woman.
Dörte Hansen was born in 1964, learned several languages such as Gaelic, Finnish and Basque and was awarded a PhD in linguistics. She then turned to journalism, spent several years working as an editor for NDR and is now an author for radio and print. Altes Land is her first novel.
Back
