They couldn’t be more different: Marie, the sharp-tongued Viennese lady, a creature of luxury, simultaneously pampered and despised by her husband Peter. And Johanna, the ‘wild animal in a human body’. Johanna stopped speaking in adolescence and left humanity behind, leading a hermit life on a remote mountain pasture for years. The cousins have not seen each other since she moved there. But now Marie is hurrying up the mountain to Johanna’s hut, panicked, covered in blood. She is on the run from her violent husband and a world in which much, unnoticed, has gone awry. For the two women, this marks the beginning of an extraordinary test of strength to claim their place in this world, and their right to live on their own terms.

In her poetical and political novel – fairy tale, parable and pulsating critique of civilisation all in one – Katharina Köller celebrates two women who empower each other and make each other believe in change.