When Stephanie Bartsch loses her beloved husband in a car accident, she is in danger of losing her footing. Life in her new role as a "widow" feels strange. She takes a break from her job, family and friends, buys a motorhome and heads south. Day by day, she explores what her new life has to offer. And that's quite a lot! She encounters helpful people, exciting landscapes and discovers writing for herself. The result is a kind of road novel: disarmingly open, honest, humorous and very different from the way people generally imagine grief.

Stephanie Bartsch, born in 1970, worked as a carpenter, youth hostel mother and literature consultant before studying social pedagogy. After a family break, she set up her own business as a coach and mediator for educational staff in 2006.