Misophonia: A Novel

(Hardback)

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Part coming-of-age tale, part family saga, an extraordinary debut novel set between Berlin, Chicago, and Jerusalem about being Jewish and German, and all the awkwardness that entails (The Guardian).

Its the hottest of summers in Chicago, and fifteen-year-old Margarita is spending her vacation as usual,under the not-so-watchful eyes of her aging maternal grandparents. The tempestuous yet vulnerable teen would much rather be at home in Germany, exploring texciting Berlin with her best friend Anna, or with Avi, her doting Israeli father, a cantor at their local synagogue with whom she has shared a special bond ever since her mother, Marsha, abandoned the family. Instead, shes stuck halfway around the world in a cavernous house, homesick and tortured by the awful sound of her grandparents chewing.

Yet young Margarita is blindsided whenthe announcement is made that arrangements have been made behind her back for her to meet Marsha in Israel before returning to Germany. Margarita wants no part of the ill-conceived plan but finds herself traveling to her fathers birthplace to spend two weeks with a mother she hardly knows in an attempt at overdue reconciliation. When her mother fails to show up, however, its clear that things are about to go awry. Meanwhile, in Germany, Avi tries to fill the hole left by Margaritas absence with a trip of his own, embarking on a personal journey, both hope-inducing and despairing.

Expertly straddling the two narratives of daughter and father, Dana Vowinkels debut is a graceful exploration of imperfect family relationships and larger cultural displacement. Centered around a neurotic but loveable cast of characters, Misophonia is a heartfelt and tender story that explores modern Jewish identity and the diaspora an illuminating portrait of Jewish life in contemporary Germany.

Translated from the German by Adrian Nathan West

Reviews

Dana Vowinckel's wonderfulnovel carried me along like a riptide. It introduced me to dimensions I know little about: the wildemotions of a fifteen-year-old and the inner dialogue of an observant Jew. The book is rich in contrasting ingredients: thetensions between parents and children or the absurd calculus of the pious and the secular living together. Vowinckel's debut rises above a merely anecdotal novel to the heights of the best of literature. EricBogosian [WithMisophonia, Vowinckel] has made German-language contemporary literature a more beautiful place, and I'm so grateful for her book and her immense talent. Christian Kracht, author of the International Booker-longlistedEurotrash "Dana Vowinckel tells of the desires and drudgery of puberty, of everyday life and the conflicts of a religious single father and a liberal, intellectual woman, whose mode of being a mother doesn't fit any of the typical clichs. Narrated with both emotion and clarity, the novel draws its tension from the consistency of the narrative perspectives, allowing different world views to coexist even in the most intimate circles." Jury of the Leipzig Book Fair Prize [This] sensitive coming-of-age novel revealswithout kitschthe yearning to belong, while also addressing the fear of doing so. An enthralling debut. Sddeutsche Zeitung Dana Vowinckels novel is of profound wisdom; it knows about faltering, about the yearning and the turmoil of traveling the world. Julia Franck

Author Bio

Dana Vowinckel was born in Berlin in 1996 into an American-Jewish-German family. She grew up bilingually and bi-culturally between Chicago and Berlin, and studied linguistics and literature in Berlin, Toulouse, and Cambridge. Her debut novel Misophonia won, amongst others, the Mara Cassens Prize and the literature prize of the Association of Arts and Culture of the German Economy, and was shortlisted for the prestigious Leipzig Book Fair Prize. She lives in Berlin. Adrian Nathan West has translated more than thirty books from Spanish, Catalan, and German, including Benjamn Labatuts When We Cease to Understand the World, a finalist for both the National Book Award for Translated Literature and the International Booker Prize. An essayist and literary critic, he is the author of the novel My Fathers Diet. He lives in Philadelphia.