Tilda's days are strictly timetabled: studying, working at the supermarket checkout, looking after her little sister Ida - and on bad days, looking after their mother too. The three of them live in the saddest house on Fröhlichstrasse in a small town that Tilda hates. Her friends are long gone, living in Amsterdam or Berlin, only Tilda has stayed. Because someone has to be there for Ida, earn money, bear the responsibility. There are no fathers worth mentioning, her mother is an alcoholic. One day, however, things start to change: Tilda is offered a doctorate in Berlin, and there is a flash of a future that promises freedom. And Viktor turns up, the older brother of Ivan, with whom Tilda used to be friends. Viktor, who - just like her - always swims 22 lengths. But just when Tilda almost thinks everything might be fine, the situation at home gets completely out of hand.
22 Lanes' is a raw yet tender story about the devastation of family life and how happiness can be found between responsibility and freedom.

"Caroline Wahl finds the special in the everyday and the comforting in the painful. A touching and subtle book that you would like to be friends with." BENEDICT WELLS

"I whizzed through '22 Bahnen' and was absolutely thrilled. Heart-warming, subtle, merciless and really beautiful at the same time." ALINA BRONSKY.