Spätestens Morgen

Unexpectedly strong are the tender creatures of these stories. They hold out when the ground beneath them swings, lash out at the moment of danger and break out of their cage as soon as they feel wind beneath their wings. Like Ginza, who defends her independence in the pulsating, overpowering metropolis of Shanghai by living in a tiny apartment with friends and guiding tourists around the city. Or Sophie, whose headstrong daughter Clarice takes her photographer friend with her to the family's summer house, thus upsetting the family balance. In her stories, which Zoë Jenny is summarizing here for the first time in one volume, she proves to be a master of the short form: These are stories with a bittersweet resonance, whose force is sweeping from the first movement. Something abysmal penetrates each of the seemingly so gentle sentences and envelops them in fine melancholy. It is the fear of loss, the knowledge of the vulnerable spots, that resonates under the surface.