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Susanne Röckel

Susanne Röckel

born in Darmstadt in 1953, lives and works in Munich as an author and translator from English and French. She has received numerous awards for her work, including the Mara Cassens Prize of the Literaturhaus Hamburg (1998), twice the Tukan Prize of the City of Munich (2003, 2018) and the Franz Hessel Prize (2019) for her novel ‘Der Vogelgott’ (2018), with which she was also shortlisted for the German Book Prize. "Vera. Eine Erinnerung" is her first book published by Residenz Verlag.

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Coverabbildung von 'Vera'

Susanne Röckel - Vera

A Memory

Darmstadt, 1968: the ‘Callsen Trial’ is underway. Eight SS men have been accused of carrying out the 1941 massacre at Babyn Yar. Dina Proničeva, a woman of unimaginable courage, survived the slaughter, and she has arrived in Germany to testify at the trial. On the day it took place, Susanne Röckel, then fourteen years old, watched the car bringing the witness to court. This encounter prompts a literary meditation on resistance, justice and denial. Memories from her youth are interwoven with the records of the trial and haunting images of the days the witness from Kyiv spent in post-war Germany. Part novel, part memoir, Vera is a moving and careful attempt to face the incomprehensible.