East Germany, 1970-something. Karen's relationship with her great love, Peters, is faltering. Taking their daughter Bettina with her, Karen leaves the city - where, fifteen years earlier, she had arrived full of hopes and dreams for an academic career - and returns to the village she had once found so stifling.

Back in her childhood home, Karen finds work at the local farming co-operative. As she settles into the rural rhythms of life, she begins to earn the respect of the village women around her, and slowly regains a sense of stability. But what is she hoping to find here? Is it a sense of balance between the competing demands of motherhood, ambition and love - and the involvement of the state? Or is it certainty about the fate of her relationship with Peters? There are risks in her search for self-discovery - but Karen has already realised that she must take the leap into the unknown if she is to truly live.

Vivid and authentic, Karen W. opens a time capsule and reveals the GDR in all its quotidian detail. First published in 1974, the novel was quickly withdrawn after the author came under the scrutiny of the Stasi, and paints a vivid portrait of a woman searching for self-fulfilment under the everyday pressures of love, work, life and censorship.