Franziska Gerstenberg Wie viel Vögel (How Many Birds) Schöffling & Co., February 2004. 230 pp. ISBN 3-89561-340-1 In fifteen masterful stories Franziska Gerstenberg takes a sideways glance at the quietly extraordinary moments in ordinary lives. The situations she describes seem undramatic, and yet they form the turning points in her protagonists’ lives. Focusing on human interaction and misunderstanding, the stories describe relationships falling apart or in thrall to unequal expectations. A couple visit a zoo and break up with each other as they watch the keeper feeding the owls; a woman tries to seduce the handymen who are working in her block of flats and is left alone with the rubble; and a young man takes a girl to meet his parents on their first date, shows her the family photos, and ends by telling her she will make a beautiful bride. Nothing and at the same time everything happens. Merten’s girlfriend secretly starts taking ballet lessons and when he becomes suspicious she allows him to believe that she is seeing someone else and so he packs his bags and leaves. Sometimes the seemingly unsensational details can be the most momentous. Gerstenberg writes with wonderful economy of action, using the poetry of her language and the sharpness of her observation to tell the tale. Her characters are vividly sketched young men and women, unremarkable and yet striking figures whose lives still lie before them. Effortlessly switching between the first and the third person perspective, Gerstenberg brings out the quiet drama of their lives. Her stories quiver with uncertainty and subtle tension. With this collection Franziska Gerstenberg has made a spectacular entry onto the literary scene. How Many Birds was one of the most discussed debuts in the German-speaking world this year, and the author has been hailed as an outstanding talent. At twenty-five years old, she is the leading light of the first generation of writers to be entirely at home in the new reunified Germany, and her stories provide snapshots from contemporary German life. Writing in the best tradition of German narrative prose, this is one young author who promises great things for the future.