In the shadow of war, a generation of young Germans learns that the past is never entirely past.

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Set primarily in Hof, a Bavarian town divided from East Germany by the Iron Curtain, Heartbeats and Other Lessons follows children, adolescents, teachers, and families struggling to find their place in the uncertain decades after World War II.

 

A schoolgirl confronts antisemitism in the classroom. A frightened child discovers the consequences of labeling someone an outsider. A young German in Prague encounters the burden of history. A lonely student is crushed by expectations he cannot meet. Friends on a ski trip learn how quickly youthful bravado can become tragedy. Throughout the collection, private lives are shaped by inherited prejudice, divided loyalties, family secrets, and the moral responsibilities of growing up.

 

Drawing upon the atmosphere of postwar Germany while remaining a work of fiction, Andrea Fuchs Petzi portrays young people attempting to understand a world built upon silences. Compassionate, unsettling, and ultimately hopeful, these stories ask how we learn to see one another clearly—and whether courage can begin with a single act of understanding.