Recommended by The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction 2018

Meike Ziervogel’s new novel celebrates how humanity can thrive against all odds.

Set at the end of the Second World War when eleven million Germans fled from east to west, The Photographer explores love and survival in a time of mass migration.

Pomerania, 1933: Trude falls in love with Albert, a young photographer who takes her picture in the street. Her mother disapproves, and when war breaks out she arranges for Albert to be sent to the front. Eventually, Trude and Albert are reunited in a refugee camp near Hamburg. But now the couple face a new challenge: can they begin their relationship anew?

In a Europe of ruined cities and refugee camps, Trude and Albert learn to respect each other’s flaws and, in doing so, discover unexpected strengths.