'A compelling story of love and betrayal in the divided Berlin of the 1980s' Sunday Times Best Books of 2019

'A compelling story of love and betrayal in the divided Berlin of the 1980s' Sunday Times Best Books of 2019

'A beautifully written, evocative literary thriller set in Berlin shortly before the fall of the Wall' Financial Times Best Books of 2019

'A powerful and moving love story by a writer at the top of his game' John Boyne

In West Berlin in 1989, eighteen-year-old Ralf has just left school and is living a final golden summer with his three best friends. They spend their days swimming, smoking and daydreaming about the future, oblivious to the storm gathering on the other side of the Berlin Wall.

But an unsettling discovery about his family and a meeting with the mysterious Oz shatters everything Ralf thought he knew about love and loyalty. And as old Cold War tensions begin to tear his life apart, he finds himself caught up in a web of deceit, forced to make impossible choices about his country, his family and his heart.