"AT SEA is a true page-turner, a book you can't put down." - Harper's Bazaar
“There is an incredible amount in this novel, or rather: it wants an incredible amount at once.
Discussions of diversity and identity are allowed in prose works by authors of the
Enzensberger's generation probably already presuppose, but here also occurs
impetus critical of capitalism, which in an almost classical manner (à la Brecht, Peter Weiss,
Heiner Müller, Peter Hacks) with the help of art the process is done [...].” - Andreas Platthaus, FAZ
"'At Sea' is a complex novel that asks many questions and one big one: How can the future
look? Do we have one? That moves and is still easy to read, because Enzensberger thinks
a direct, sometimes almost factual, simple tone. Nonetheless, she is wholeheartedly involved
their characters. A piece of art.” - Katja Weise, NDR Kulturjournal / NDR Buch des Monats
The world is coming to an end. But Yada is growing up on a floating island off the German coast, built as a refuge from society’s collapse. In this smart, gripping and visionary novel, Theresia Enzensberger examines the utopian promise of new communities and happiness when loss and destruction loom.
Yada lives on a man-made island in the Baltic Sea. It is her father’s brainchild, a libertarian tech entrepreneur who had created a haven from the spiralling chaos in the outside world. Since it was first set up years ago, the island’s lustre has worn off. Algae and moss flourish on its once gleaming surfaces. Yada’s father fears that his daughter might share the fate of her mother, who suffered from a mysterious illness before her death. And one day, Yada makes a discovery that rocks the foundations of her world.
In a slick, radically contemporary style, “At Sea” questions whether we want to live in a world defined by fear of the future.