Taubenleben by Paulina Czienskowski Review

I won this book from a giveaway and honestly I didn‘t expect to love it as much as I did.

Spoiler free recap of the plot:

This book starts as Lois makes an AIDS test after a one night stand. She tells about her childhood, about her teens but she also takes us with her in her current life.

Medicore spoilers about the topics discussed: 

It is a book that relies heavily on the characters whereas the plot becomes a mere sideeffect. There isn‘t much plot going on but we learn a lot about Lois. 

She grew up in a suburb of Berlin in a so called Plattenbau which is a big concrete building that has its roots in the brutalist movement from the sixties which was founded by Corbusier among others. And just like that movement this story is straight forward, practical and in some moments even stoic. The main character tells her story at some points with a distance as if she weren‘t talking about her life and in other moments she is overly dramatic over the most common things. At first glimpse the book is very mundane but after reading it you realize that mundane in fact does not have to mean an exclusion of epic. Just like the brutalist movement Lois grew up in. Everything seems  grey and boring, but in fact it isn‘t as boring as you might think.

The book deals a lot with people in their twenties and their existental crisis. Where do we belong at, what holds the future, can we control it and if yes, are all the decisions we make the right one‘s. 

But it isn‘t only a book about Lois as a twenty something old but also about her relationship with her mother. In the talks with her mother Lois gets a different view point on things. And sometimes her mother destroys some naiv view points that were left in Lois‘ mind and other times a discussion is started between an older generation and a younger one. 

In the end we are let to question things, there isn‘t this miraculous resolution and answer to everything. Just as life itself we are left wondering what now? What is the right answer? 

It is a book so simple yet very thought provoking. Just as the tone of the writing style. Simple but beautiful and gripping. It is a story about everyday life and its ups and downs.

I gave this book 5 out of 5 stars.