The core to this novel is remembrance, and Jahrestage is a requiem for the victims of twentieth-century German history. Told in the form of recollections of Gesine Cresspahl of the history of her family from the Weimar Republic to the Prague Spring. She has fled as a single mother from the DDR to live in New York, while supporting "socialism with a human face" as forwarded by Dubček.… (more)