{"product_id":"the-bird-is-a-raven-isbn-9781400078066","title":"The Bird Is a Raven","description":"Henry and Paul are strangers when they find themselves sharing a sleeping compartment on a night train from Munich to Berlin. When they begin to talk, their stories appear to be variations on the same theme: young guys adrift in the big city, relationships gone wrong, broken hearts. Henry is running away from a triangle of friendship gone sour; Paul is running away too, but as the night unfolds and the train speeds north across the German landscape, his story turns ominous. What he finally reveals to his unsuspecting traveling companion goes into the darkest sphere of human behavior. Shocking and raw, \u003ci\u003eThe Bird is a Raven\u003c\/i\u003e is the work of a writer at the beginning of a stellar career.“Lebert explores the limits of trust, blending broad humor and sudden bursts of melodrama while maintaining a delicately balanced tension. . . . [He] does a lot with a few words.” –\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Lebert [is] the Wunderkind of pop-literature.” –\u003ci\u003eThe Daily Mirror\u003c\/i\u003e (Berlin)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Filled with. . . youthful fatalism that is counterbalanced with wild swings of elation.”–\u003ci\u003eThe Advocate\u003c\/i\u003e (Baton Rouge)\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Lebert manages to portray with beautiful images the disappointment of needing tremendous strength for things which others find to be an easy game.” –\u003ci\u003eThe World\u003c\/i\u003e (Berlin)Benjamin Lebert was born in Freiburg, Germany, in 1982. He is the author of Crazy, a best seller in Germany, which was published when he was sixteen years old.I finished high school in Munich. When I was twenty I moved to   Berlin to study ethnology. I shared an apartment in Schoneberg with   two other students. A guy named Randall and a girl named Sofia. I   hardly spent any time studying. I didn't really give a damn about   anything. I hung out in the city. I went to cafes and clubs. I met   people who were doing the same thing. Most of them had come to Berlin   from somewhere else. In fact, they all had. And they all wanted to be   discovered. Of course, they knew that they had to go out looking too.   And they did that to some extent. But they wanted above all to be   discovered.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    It's Friday night, 10:26, January 4. I'm standing on platform 18 of   the central station in Munich. My green duffel bag is lying next to   me on the ground. It's bitter cold. The wind is shaving my cheeks.   Solitary pigeons are fluttering around; one of them lands on the   tracks. The station concourse is brightly lit. There aren't many   people around. An elderly woman in a black coat is standing a few   yards away from me. She's wearing a white hat with earflaps. She's   walking back and forth, her left arm crossed over her chest, her   right hand holding a cell phone, whose buttons she's pressing with   her thumb. More solitary figures. The train is already six minutes   late. It's the train that'll take me back to Berlin after my short   visit home. Berlin, where everything is bright and beautiful. At   least that's what you used to hear. From everyone. From all the guys   who were raving about Berlin: man, you gotta go there. It's a great   town. It's like, you know, everything's moving! There's action there.   The air isn't air--it's filled with gold dust. You know, like, you   inhale gold dust. And the girls! They're incredible! Whether they've   been there all along or just arrived, you can tell they've been   breathing in tons of gold dust.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    But none of that was really true. I mean, the girls I came across in   Berlin, most of them were really great, but they weren't breathing   gold dust. The air they sucked in through their beautiful noses was   nostalgia. And not just the girls.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    I stare at the announcement board: 10:29. The train will be here any   minute. I think of the three days I've just spent in Munich, think   about my mother. She's a doctor. Each night when I sleep at my   parents' house, she puts a little white bowl of sliced kiwis on my   nightstand. She used to do that before too. Now it gets on my nerves.   But in Berlin I still think about it. When I'm at a club and see all   the people who have come to the city like me and are dancing like   crazy. All of them with this expectant look in their eyes, which can   even be detected in the dim lights of the club. Maybe only really   detectable in the dark. Like shimmering cats' eyes. And then I wonder   if they have somebody somewhere who, regardless of what happens, will   keep on putting sliced kiwis on their nightstand.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    The loudspeaker announces the train and it pulls in, the wheels   grinding. As I get on, I suddenly feel sick, like I'm going to fall   backward onto the platform. But I don't. I'm carrying my bag over my   shoulder. I squeeze my way though the corridor. Past two girls who   only grudgingly make way. One of them is chewing gum. Where's the   sleeper? My compartment is number 39. It's a long walk. I also have   to go through the dining car. It's quite full. Blue cigarette smoke   hangs over the tables. Voices and laughter. Beneath my feet I feel   that the train has started up again. At last, number 39.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    A white card key is sticking in the door. I unlock it. The second bed   is still empty. Mine is the bottom one. Not much space here. On a   shelf are two bananas, two apples. There are also two upturned   drinking glasses and two little bottles of water. In front of the   window: drawn gray curtains with small violet dots. The door to the   washroom is narrow. A shower cubicle, a toilet, a small washbowl.   Pretty much all the colors in the compartment are gray and violet. It   somehow smells of plastic, not of fresh air. Not of air that nine   hours later, when we arrive in Berlin, will transform itself into   gold dust. I hang my brown coat on a hook, sit down on my bed. Not   quite sure if I should undress, or wait till the other guy gets here.   I can hear the sounds from the compartment next door quite clearly. A   woman's voice says: \"I've had enough; I can't go on.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Last time I traveled in a sleeper, there was some old guy in the   upper bunk who kept calling down to me that I should come up for a   fuck. Back then I wasn't into it. And I'm still not. That's why I'm   wondering who'll be coming in this time. There's a knock. I open the   door. My sleeper companion turns out to be a young guy, about my age.   He's small and delicate-looking, has short brown hair, and a black   backpack, which he immediately puts down next to my bag. From his   movements, the way he keeps shifting his weight from one foot to the   other and darting his head back and forth, I think right away: a bird.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"What's up?\" he says.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Hi there,\" I say. We smile at each other.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Want to hit the dining car?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Yeah, let's go for it.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    I'm not actually hungry, but I think it'll do me good to chat a bit   before going to sleep.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    A small table frees up in the dining car. What will we drink? He   orders an apple juice, I order a beer. It's black outside. You can't   see anything of the landscape, except for a few lights. Our faces are   mirrored in the windows. The drinks arrive. A small, homey lamp is   burning on the table. He also orders fried eggs and spinach.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"I could eat a cow!\" he says. \"By the way, my name's Henry.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"I'm Paul.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    The train takes a curve, the waitress balances her tray past us. Is   it the monotonous clack-clack of the wheels creating this peculiar   mood? An anonymous familiarity, like two strangers on a hike who meet   by a river. They sit down together. They don't know each other. Their   only link is the river.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"I'm heading for Berlin,\" Henry says. \"I have no other choice.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    His fried eggs arrive. I've never seen anyone scarf down two eggs and   spinach faster. He wipes his mouth with his napkin and looks at me.   \"You've got a brown spot in your eye. In the white part. What's that?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"My mom noticed it too and brought it up. No idea what that's all   about. I've just had it three days.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    He sits there for a while as if he were asleep with his eyes open.   Just as I am about to ask him when he ate last, he begins talking: \"I   had two friends. They were my only friends. We stuck together. When I   was hanging out with them I wasn't afraid of anything. Their names   were Jens and Christine. They were both older than me. Jens was   twenty-three and Christine was twenty-eight. I'm eighteen. Now we   won't be together anymore. Ever.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    For a moment there is silence.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Do you mind if I smoke?\" he asks. He doesn't wait for an answer. He   pulls a cigarette from his pack of Marlboros and hands me one too. He   lights both. A few lit houses wipe past our windows. Then there's   blackness again.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"I don't understand,\" Henry continues. \"I don't understand how it all   happened. That's why I have to talk about it with someone. If I talk   about it with someone, it'll all come back again and I'll figure it   out. Remembering things is so fucking important. Because you have to   remember things before you can deal with them. I just have to go over   it again and--\" He breaks off. \"You know what I mean?\" he asks after   a while.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Yeah, sure do,\" I answer, and cautiously add, \"It's not all that   hard to understand.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"There's nothing to understand,\" he retorts sharply. Suddenly a fire   rages in his eyes. \"I mean, I have no idea how she's doing. And I   don't know if I'm ever going to see her again. After all that stuff.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    The train stops in a brightly lit station. A traveler comes into the   dining car, sits down at a table, and orders a cup of coffee. The   waitress says, \"We're no longer serving.\" The traveler is angry. She   couldn't care less. She comes to our table and says, \"I'm closing up   now.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    I hadn't noticed that the dining car had emptied out.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Separate checks?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"No, one check,\" Henry says, and puts his wallet on the table.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Seventeen euros, or thirty-four marks.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    He hasn't touched his apple juice. We go back to our compartment. We   lie down in our bunks. The lights are out. But I've opened the window   curtains. Blackness flies past, like an enormous cloud of dark   insects. The moving train provides the musical accompaniment. \"I hate   the darkness,\" Henry says. \"This might sound weird, but for me   darkness always sheds light on terrible things.\" He hesitates for a   moment. Then he starts talking.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"I don't know how it is with you, but my biggest problem is girls. I   always wanted to be with a girl, but I couldn't get it together.   Those school dances were the worst. I'd watch them all dancing. But   not with me. Their straps would slip down over their shoulders, and   the stupid guys dancing with them would pull them back up with a   cheesy grin. I would have done anything to be the guy to pull a   girl's strap back up over her shoulder. But it never happened. And   the girls all looked so good. Like they were glowing. And they   smelled as if just before coming to the party they'd been lying in   some magical perfumed meadow in another world, another universe. I   was always standing there, so far away from it all. Even though I was   so close. The people on the dance floor were inside an invisible   bubble. And I was outside. That's a little weird, if you think about   it. I could have walked up to one of the girls, you know, to touch   her shoulder. But I wouldn't really be touching her shoulder. Just   the bubble, right? I also couldn't really dance. At those parties   there was only one thing I was good at. The one thing I was always   good at: taking a shit. I always got the shits. I'd run to the toilet   and shit my brains out. I'd hunch forward, sweating so my clothes   stuck to my skin, and I'd have to struggle to yank down my shorts.   And with everything that came pouring out, I couldn't shit out my   sadness. What's more, I'd be pissed off at the girls. I'd see them   there, dancing, giggling like idiots, while those assholes had their   arms wrapped around them, squeezing their breasts. I'd be thinking:   girls aren't the wonderful creatures I imagined them to be, delicate   and sensitive and soft and vulnerable, who always have to be looked   after and all that. Girls are jerks. They know exactly what they're   doing to you.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    I hear the bunk creak above me. And then his voice again: \"Christine   was the first, the first one I really fell in love with. I'm actually   related to her, in a roundabout way. So I've known her from   childhood. She lived in Belgium. I'd sometimes see her at family   get-togethers, or over the holidays. I remember she always had an   attitude with me, and she would lie in the sun with her chin up as if   she was balancing something on it. And she'd never play soccer with   me in the yard. Unlike her little brother, who I liked a lot more.   Until one day she moved in with my grandmother in Munich. She must   have been about twenty-six then. And sick. I was living in Munich   too, with my mom. Grandmother is my mother's mother. I'd often visit   my grandmother. She lived in the suburbs. We went for walks together.   She'd tell me stories of days long gone that were now high up in the   sky, hidden and invisible among twinkling stars. Days that had to be   brought back through her stories. My grandmother was good at that. At   bringing back stories from somewhere. When Christine moved in with   her, I visited her even more often. Sometimes I slept there. I didn't   know what was wrong with Christine. She was very pale, hardly spoke,   and had an absent look on her face. As I found out later, that was   part of her disease. She didn't have that giggle I couldn't stand in   other girls, she always just sat in a chair, her feet bare. Her feet   were tiny. I'd watch them. They didn't look like feet you could walk   around on. The skin on her soles was completely soft. Like it was   everywhere on her body. Christine's body was immaculate. Long thin   legs, thin arms, small breasts, her nipples stood out under her   T-shirt. She never wore a bra. Wait, I forgot to say that her skin   had a golden glow. And her long hair was brown. She slept in a blue   bed in the remodeled attic. I slept on the couch in the living room   whenever I didn't head back home in the evening. One night--can you   imagine?--I went up the stairs and sat on the top step for five   hours. Just to be near her--can you imagine?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Henry clears his throat. Suddenly he goes off in a completely   different direction: \"So, we're heading to Berlin. Great! Tell me   about the city. What's the deal in Berlin?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"What?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"I don't know anything about Berlin. Can you fill me in?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Why?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \"Just to change the subject. Come on, please, tell me.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    I think. I hadn't reckoned that I'd suddenly have to say something.   And I'm really not in the mood. I notice how hard it is for the words   to come out. \"Just to change the subject,\" I repeat. \"Berlin. That   city eats you up. That's what occurs to me off the cuff. Literally   bites off parts of your body. I mean it. When you walk the   streets--like, wherever you go--you see people lying there left and   right, the city having bitten off one of their legs. Or a hand. At   some point they're totally devoured. And even if some of them haven't   been devoured yet, at least every one of them has been slobbered   over. The place is full of people slobbered over by Berlin.A Novel","brand":"Vintage","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46300272885989,"sku":"NP9781400078066","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781400078066.jpg?v=1767738384","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/the-bird-is-a-raven-isbn-9781400078066","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}