

Reading from the novel
Advance tickets from June 9, 2026
The great epic of our time
Sanditz, a small town on the edge of the republic. Here live old officers, civil rights activists, organ builders, tile collectors, local journalists, self-proclaimed resistance fighters, dreamers, early retirees, children, lovers, timid archivists, and the Wenzel family.
Warmly and with multiple perspectives, Lukas Rietzschel weaves the story of the family and the residents of Sanditz into a panorama of German stories – from the end of the GDR to the recent past, from the occupation of the local Stasi headquarters to a volunteer's fight in Ukraine, from toiling on West German construction sites to an isolated island existence during the Corona epidemic.
A novel about new beginnings and decline, the success and failure of rebellion, friendship and family in tumultuous times, about the desire for belonging and the longing for freedom.