'We got used to the silence around us and to the stories we didn’t understand.' 

Stine was just four years old when the country she was born into ceased to exist. Too young to remember life before the fall of the Berlin Wall, she grew up in a household haunted by loss and fracture. Her family struggled to find its place in a newly unified Germany, and questions about the past were met with silence – a silence that transformed their home into a place of fear. 

Told in fragments that blend fiction, poetry and a searing investigation of the past, The Possibility of Happiness finds Stine, now an author, reckoning with her family’s – and her country’s – complex history. 

'Rabe’s debut is powerful. . . . while it says 'novel' on the cover, The Possibility of Happiness is primarily an analysis of familial structures, as they sometimes were in the GDR, and a critique of the system.' taz

‘Anne Rabe allows us to experience the pain of coming to terms with the past (and) offers an answer to the question of how to break the cycle of violence: by having the courage to ask questions.’ RBB Kultur

'The Possibility of Happiness explains why East Germany’s history of violence since reunification has differed from West Germany’s. ... Anne Rabe postulates a range of causes, which she vividly illustrates through Stine’s family history, something a sociological study could not achieve…' Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

'Anne Rabe has written an intriguing novel about experiences of violence in the GDR and how they are passed down through generations. .... It explores the overt and covert brutalities within families and the state, questioning their continued existence…' Welt am Sonntag

'The Possibility of Happiness intertwines memoir, family research and essay. Anne Rabe skilfully interweaves the personal aspects of family with social analysis. A powerful and moving work that transforms the fragmentation of a traumatised self into a literary form.' WDR

'It’s astonishing what this montage of research, literary quotes, dreams and memories, and the interplay of internal and external dialogue, brings into focus. Anne Rabe’s research transcends mere erudition; the emerging picture fractures into ever more minute pieces, and within this fragmentation lies its profound veracity.’ Stuttgarter Zeitung

ISBN-13: 9781836750352

Weight: 505 grams

Format: Paperback

Country of Origin (language): Germany

Language: German

Pub Date: 12/11/2026

Page Extent: 352 Pages