Against the World is a great German novel, a sweeping story of how history changes a village, how pop culture changes the provinces, how friendship changes individuals.
East Friesia in the mid-1970s. Cows graze in the meadows and low-flying combat planes rend the bucolic silence. The hedges on the estate are neatly trimmed, the new cars freshly polished on the driveways. This is the world into which Daniel Kuper, the son of a dynasty of druggists, is born. A delicate, secretive boy with too much imagination and too few opportunities.
Strange phenomena begin to take place. Snow in the middle of summer, a corn circle, a schoolboy run over by a train, swastikas daubed on walls. And Daniel Kuper gets the blame. The more he tries to prove his innocence, the more he gets tied up in the accusations. Daniel Kuper begins a battle against the village and its inhabitants.

Jan Brandt is a German journalist and writer. Katy Derbyshire is a Berlin-based translator from London.