In the summer of 1961, things are not really going well for the Fisch family of caretakers in Erfurt: their eighth child is already on the way, the flat is far too small, the food supply is poor, and the schoolchildren are being spied on by their teachers. When Dad's selfish mother also wants to move in with them and he can't manage to resist her, Mom's patience is over once and for all.

Many thousands of GDR citizens leave for the West in those days – why shouldn't the Fischs be able to do the same, she thinks to herself, and puts a gun to her husband's head: disguised as preparations for a very casual family holiday, the children, the chicken Hempel and father Fisch are being arranged – pardon, vested. In East Berlin, however, the government has completely different plans for this summer of 1961, and the mother-in-law also shoots across ...

I am pleased to be able to include this lively book, which was published by my colleague Buchbäcker Verlag in 2011, in the programme alongside Michael Wäser's novel »In uns ist Licht« after the latter's regrettable closure just in time for the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Wall.