''The pain of losing something precious can be forgotten over time. But our missed opportunities never leave us, and every time they come back to haunt us, we ache.'' A shy young man leaves his home in rural Turkey to learn a trade and discover life in 1920s Berlin. There, amid the city''s bustling streets, elegant museums, passionate politics and seedy cabarets, a chance meeting transforms his life forever. Caught between his desire for freedom and his yearning to belong, he struggles to hold on to the new life he has found.

Autorentext
Sabahattin Ali (1907-1948) *was born in the Ottoman town of Egridere (now Ardino in southern Bulgaria). A teacher, novelist, short-story writer and journalist, he owned and edited a popular weekly newspaper called Marko Pasa. He is admired for the determination with which he defended his political beliefs, which are anchored through his writing. Madonna in A Fur Coat*, first published in 1943, is his best loved work and a touchstone of Turkish literary culture which continues to resonate profoundly with readers young and old today.Maureen Freely is a writer, a Professor at Warwick University, and the Chair of Trustees of English PEN. She has published seven novels and numerous translations of twentieth century Turkish classics and contemporary authors including five books by the Nobel Prize-winning novelist Orhan Pamuk.Alexander Dawe** has translated several works from French and Turkish including the short stories of Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar and Sait Faik.