Ach, Papa

Mareike Nieberding is a wonderful author. She writes directly and clearly, with power and flow. Volker Weidermann. Throughout her entire childhood and youth, Mareike Nieberding was picked up and collected by her father. No matter where she was, no matter how drunk, no matter who she was with. At one o'clock in the morning from the shooting festival, at seven after her shift in the pub. Her father was her protector, comforter, a relentless optimist. When she sits across from him today, she wonders who this graying man with freckles really is, what he feels and thinks, whether he is happy. Somewhere between then and now, the two of them have stopped getting to know each other. When he picks her up from the train station, they talk on the way home about the lives of neighbors and acquaintances, until they finally stand in silence in front of their own house. They do not argue. They simply have nothing to say to each other. Oh, Dad, tell me.