Lions in the Dark

Mascha, Lev, and Aras meet in a small city in Germany in the early nineties. Mascha and Lev are Jewish refugees from the former Soviet Union. Aras works at the petrol station across the road and befriends the kids from the refugee shelter. As the child of Turkish immigrants, he knows what it’s like to be marginalised and viewed as a foreigner. When Aras is brutally beaten on the street one night, and there are growing reports on the TV about arson attacks on refugee shelters, the adults in Mascha’s shelter start to wonder whether coming to Germany had been a mistake.

By the early years of the new millennium, the three friends only see each other every now and then, writing occasionally in an attempt to catch up, but something always seems to get in the way. Mascha wants to distance herself from her migrant past and heads to New York to further her career. Soon enough, her name is appearing in important art magazines. She returns to Europe and makes her way as a set designer and visual artist. Aras and Lev come to visit her in Berlin for an opening, but they struggle to relate to each other. A microcosm of a splintered society. Time and again, they fight to hang onto their connection. Can they still be friends despite everything?
 

»Salzmann’s sentences flow across the page, their style is lavish and immediate […] Wonderful.« Claudia Voigt, Literaturspiegel on Sasha Marianna Salzmann's Beside Myself.

»Salzmann’s cool, disaffected narrative voice [...] is a wonder to behold.« Kirkus Reviews