Im Namen der Barmherzigkeit

The true story of a foster child on a mountain farm. Compassionately and inspiringly, Spiegel bestseller author Hera Lind tells the fate of Steffi in her nonfiction novel "In the Name of Mercy," who has endured terrible experiences. But she has not been silenced.

In the Name of Mercy, the Styrian farming family Kellerknecht takes in a foster child every year. Thus, nearly three-year-old Steffi arrives at the remote farm in the 1970s. Among the other foster children, she quickly learns that she must work hard for her meager meals and the bunk bed in the attic, and she does so barefoot. From the age of nine, Steffi is regularly abused by the farmer. By fifteen, she is pregnant and is sent to a convent where merciful nuns care for unwed young mothers. Steffi wants to provide her child with a better childhood and sets out to find her biological mother. A touching fate about a repressed chapter of our history.

What happened to Steffi was no accident: Until the 1980s, children in homes were systematically placed with impoverished farmers—not just in Austria. Bestseller author Hera Lind gives a voice to thousands of children through Steffi in her nonfiction novel.