‘Die Kriegerin’ by Helene Bukowski

‘Die Kriegerin’ [~the female warrior] by Helene Bukowski follows Lisbeth and the (initially unnamed) warrior—two women bound by a complex, painful relationship. It's a story of closeness, of silence, and of desperate attempts to harden oneself: bodies and minds steeled against the world, in the hope that pain won’t find a way in.

Lisbeth works as a florist in Berlin. One evening, she returns home to her partner Malik, their child Eden, and a circle of friends. The mood is joyful and carefree. And yet, Lisbeth can’t bear it. Almost immediately, she leaves everything behind and drives to the Baltic Sea. Only here, near the salt and waves, can her atopic skin begin to heal. The skin she longs to shed.

As the days unfold by the sea, fragments of Lisbeth’s past surface—how she met the warrior during their basic military training in the Bundeswehr, and how their lives became entangled. But this is not just a novel of memory. The story moves forward, too, tracing Lisbeth’s uncertain steps toward something like healing—or reckoning.

A powerful exploration of violence, trauma, and the wounds we carry both alone and together.

CW: mental illness (including depression and anxiety), rape, suicide, (intergenerational) trauma