Silvia Tennenbaum’s social novel spans the period from 1903 to 1945 and tells the story of the Wertheims, a liberal Jewish family living in Frankfurt. It focuses on banker Eduard Wertheim and the families of his four brothers, all of whom pursue different paths in life. The social and economic rise of the Wertheims does not preserve their freedom from being increasingly curtailed as the Nazis gain power. Each character responds differently to the question of whether to go into exile and where. The family of Eduard’s great-niece Clara, a character who has some autobiographical similarities with the author, flees to the USA and finds out what it means to adapt and get to grips with a new culture and language. After the war, Clara and her parents, for all their relief at having found a safe haven, also have to live with the knowledge that not all the Wertheims were able to escape persecution.

When Silvia Tennenbaum wrote the novel, Frankfurt, the city of her birth, was only a memory. It was not until the German translation was published in 1983 that the author went back there – her first visit since her emigration. She reflects on this experience in her essay Auschwitz and Life (1992): while visiting the once-familiar places, which had now become „halb vergessene Ecken und öde Gärten“ [“half-forgotten corners and barren gardens”, ed. trans.], she found that she no longer felt any connection with the city of her birth. It was not until the writer became caught up in Frankfurt’s present and forged contacts with historical initiatives and memorial projects that she once again became able to feel that the place from which she had been exiled was home.