In a small German town in 1945 Etta celebrates the return of her eldest son, Max, from the front line, but it soon becomes clear that all is not well with him. “All my strings are cut,” he confesses. Meanwhile her younger son, Georg, flees a Hitler Youth camp, attempting to come home. Inspired by her family’s history, Binder unfolds a harrowing tale in limpid, expressive prose.
The Vanishing Sky is set in Germany in 1945. Etta and Josef live small lives in a country teetering on defeat. All Etta wants is both her boys home. Max is on the eastern front, while Georg is with the Hitler Youth, training to be a soldier for a war that everybody knows is lost.... The Vanishing Sky is a heartbreaking portrait of an ordinary family shattered by a war they didn’t want.