“A spare, exquisite gem of a novel, Jenny Erpenbeck's Visitation stopped me cold. The story follows the life of one house on the banks of a Bradenburg lake, outside of Berlin, and the inhabitants who reside there over the course of one hundred years. A fierce and wildly intelligent look at how we live our lives, both in respite and in duress, which things have meaning, and what we need to call a place a home. Visitation is a biography of a place, a story of displacement and irreparable loss, and an intimate and deeply personal exploration of the private places we cultivate to house our souls. This book will change you.”