Brittle land, reticent people, profound secrets ... An exciting debut novel as mysterious as its setting in the Lower Rhine ... "She wakes from the screams. From the silence that follows. She stumbles barefoot down the steep wooden stairs, stubs her toe on the threshold to the scullery, presses her whole weight against the heavy door. The neon light bites into her eyes. Tea drips from the kitchen table down the oilcloth and pools on the linoleum floor. The heavy pot lies motionless on its belly and spout. A chair is broken. Her heart pounds in her head." Old Gietmann is dead. They find his body brutally mutilated on a country road amid the endless fields of the Lower Rhine. On the same day, his obituary appears in the local newspaper. "Life is limited, but memory is infinite." Peter Böhm.