Kairos

You could describe Kairos as a Manhattan story—an ill-fated romance between a 50-something man and a teenage girl—or as an allegory for East Germany before, during, and after unification, but neither summary does full justice to this subtle and humane novel. More than anything it is the story of two vivid, individual people caught in time—historical time and their own mismatched, contingent lifetimes—and if their story happens to resonate with the national drama they find themselves part of, as it so brilliantly does, that just adds to its particular, personal depth. It's romantic and a bit austere, it's lovely and brutal, and it's the best novel I've read in quite a while.