The two sensitive, empathetic protagonists Maja and Sebastian face evil in different guises, fighting for their own survival, that of animals and that of values. At the centre of Samota is empathy and the question of why so many people lack it or have lost it.

Volha Hapeyeva gathers words that have accompanied her through her nomadic years moving between Belarus, Germany, Crete and Japan, shaping them into a poetic, personal and political »dictionary«.

The rediscovery of a novel, which was written in 1931.

A great discovery: Mela Hartwig’s novel The Lost Dream, written in 1943/44: Mela Hartwig invokes a world of yesterday, in strong contrast to the terrible time in which it was written during the Second World War.

»The roaring twenties of literature with Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis as background« (Reinhold Tauber, OÖN)

A fearless novel from 1929: Mela Hartwig debates the gender theories on a level with the contradictions of her time and manages to unsettle her audience even 80 years later.

Bettina Hartz’s debut novel is a book, that fascinates with its vivid language and and its magical, fairytale-like style.

»If someone is scared of getting older, they should try Grenzland Zwischenland. Who relates old age to anxiety and despair will not find better words of comfort.« (Karl-Markus Gauss, SZ)

»In her tales, Helbich achieves a tremendous effect with the elaborate combination of simple descriptions. She finds words for the unspeakable.« (Isabella Pohl, Der Standard)

Ilse Helbich’s unsentimental notes from an endangered and thus all the more valuable life in old age

A life in Vienna – an impressive and poignant testimony.

Tinged with autobiographical details, Helbich’s text The House tells the story of a woman over 60, who, against any reason and against the well-meaning advice of her friends, grants herself her dearest wish and buys an old house.

Pictures and Stories from a sunken world – the rare joy in the recollection of a preserved past.

Monika Helfer creates 16 scenes from families in her mind games. She shows ways of starting a family, leaving it, destroying it and saving it.

An opulent and imaginatively exuberant epic novel set in India, in which the narrator, following a dubious assignment, travels from Vienna across the length and breadth of India.

»I would like to suggest contemplating those novels by Peter Handke or Christoph Ransmayr, by Elfriede Jelinek or Urs Widmer, published throughout the last two and a half decades, from another angle for a change – as if those authors were Hoffer’s successors.« (Hermann Wallmann, WDR)

Of the terror of not being loved – a perplexing novel about desire

Thomas Jonigk portrays two very different people with empathy and kindness and leads them out of a seemingly hopeless situation.

In her second novel Anna Kim concentrates on missing persons – »A moving novel.« (FAZ)

An account of Greenland that goes beyond a mere scenic narration: a piercing study on being different.