A young girl growing up in the forties on a vast estate near Munich lives a life charmed by privilege yet scarred by place and time. Everyday routine is upended as the estate becomes home to friends, family, Prussian royals, Polish peasants, and others displaced by the war. Rendered with insight, humor, and visual lyricism, Beatrix Ost's memoir testifies to the lasting influence of childhood experience.

Beatrix Ost was born in Stuttgart, Germany, in 1940. She studied dance in Munich and art with Oskar Kokoschka in Salzburg. Now a US resident, Ost divides her time between Charlottesville, Virginia, and New York City.