A portrait of the artist as a young woman in a Berlin that can't escape its history: an electric debut novel about the daughter of Afghan refugees and her year of nightclubs, bad romance, and self-discovery 'Kaleidoscopic, full of style and soul' Raven Leilani 'A beautiful coming-of-age story about identity and discovery' Elle, The Cult Books We Can't Wait To Read In 2025 'A no-bullshit must-read debut' Kaveh Akbar In Berlin's underground, where techno rattles buildings still scarred with the violence of the last century, nineteen-year-old Nila finds her tribe. In their company she can escape the parallel city that made her, the public housing block packed with refugees and immigrants, where the bathrooms are infested with silverfish and the walls outside are graffitied with swastikas. Escaping into the clubs, Nila tries to outrun the shadow of her dead mother, once a feminist revolutionary; her catatonic, defeated father; and the cab-driver uncles who seem to idle on every corner. To anyone who asks, her family is Greek, not Afghani. And then Nila meets American writer Marlowe Woods, whose literary celebrity, though fading, opens her eyes to a world of patrons and festivals, one that imbues her dreams of life as an artist with new possibility. But as she finds herself drawn further into his orbit and ugly, barely submerged tensions begin to roil and claw beneath the city's cosmopolitan veneer, everything she hopes for, hates, and believes about herself will be challenged. 'Rarely has the wildness and bewilderment of youth been conveyed with such richly textured heat' Garth Greenwell
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Good Girl
von Aria Aber
A portrait of the artist as a young woman in a Berlin that can't escape its history: an electric debut novel about the daughter of Afghan refugees and her year of nightclubs, bad romance, and self-discovery 'Kaleidoscopic, full of style and soul' Raven Leilani 'A beautiful coming-of-age story about identity and discovery' Elle, The Cult Books We Can't Wait To Read In 2025 'A no-bullshit must-read debut' Kaveh Akbar In Berlin's underground, where techno rattles buildings still scarred with the violence of the last century, nineteen-year-old Nila finds her tribe. In their company she can escape the parallel city that made her, the public housing block packed with refugees and immigrants, where the bathrooms are infested with silverfish and the walls outside are graffitied with swastikas. Escaping into the clubs, Nila tries to outrun the shadow of her dead mother, once a feminist revolutionary; her catatonic, defeated father; and the cab-driver uncles who seem to idle on every corner. To anyone who asks, her family is Greek, not Afghani. And then Nila meets American writer Marlowe Woods, whose literary celebrity, though fading, opens her eyes to a world of patrons and festivals, one that imbues her dreams of life as an artist with new possibility. But as she finds herself drawn further into his orbit and ugly, barely submerged tensions begin to roil and claw beneath the city's cosmopolitan veneer, everything she hopes for, hates, and believes about herself will be challenged. 'Rarely has the wildness and bewilderment of youth been conveyed with such richly textured heat' Garth Greenwell
Aktuelle Rezensionen(3)
Rezension von LuzieIch fand es der Wahnsinn. Das Ende hat mich zwar ein wenig enttäuscht aber sonst ein absolutes Muss
Rezension von VerenaI loved the writing style, it’s raw, poetic, and full of lines that just stay with you. I marked so so many of them. The story feels heavy and melancholic, more about atmosphere and emotion. It’s quiet but intense in its own way. I liked the main character, buuut I also didn’t, which honestly made her feel very real. She’s complicated, sometimes frustrating, but deeply human. But I’m not sure if I would like her as a friend. It’s a great debut and it was a great read.
Rezension von HannaNila, die Protagonistin des Romans, ist eine junge Philosophiestudentin mit afghanischen Wurzeln, die versucht ihren Platz in der Welt, konkreter in Deutschland, zu finden und dabei in eine negative Abwärtsspirale aus Lügen, Alkohol, Drogen und sexualisierter Gewalt gerät. Der Roman greift dabei eine Vielzahl an Themen auf – von Klassismus über Rassismus bis hin zu toxischen Beziehungen ist alles dabei, wobei es leider manchmal ein wenig an Tiefgang fehlt. Spannend fand ich Nilas Bestreben ihre eigene Stimme als Künstlerin zu finden und die Exkurse zur Fotografie ebenso wie die Darstellung der Berliner Kunstszene in diesem Zusammenhang. Durch ihre Beziehung mit dem amerikanischen Schriftsteller Marlowe erhält sie Zugang zu "intellektuellen Kreisen", doch die Scham über die eigene Herkunft schmerzt in diesem von weißen, privilegierten Menschen dominierten Raum noch mehr ... Ausschweifende Drogen- und Partyszenen nehmen viel Platz ein, womit ich mir persönlich etwas schwer getan habe - das hätte einfach ein bisschen weniger ausführlich sein können. Während die Darstellung der Nebencharaktere recht oberflächlich bleibt, überzeugt Nila als Protagonistin mit einer komplexen, vielschichtigen Persönlichkeit; allerdings fand auch ihre - für eine Coming-of-age typische - Charakterentwicklung erst gegen Ende und dafür recht abrupt statt. Ich gebe zu, dass ich zwischendurch überlegt habe, das Buch abzubrechen, da ich mich anfangs nicht wirklich in die Geschichte hineinfühlen konnte ... Schlussendlich bin ich aber froh, es nicht getan zu haben, da das Ende dann doch noch richtig stark ist und genau dem entspricht, was ich mir von dem Buch erwartet habe. Kein Roman, den man unbedingt gelesen haben muss, aber wenn man begonnen hat, lohnt es sich definitiv bis zum Ende durchzuhalten.