Author · Fehmarn Island
A novel and flash fiction – imagined on Fehmarn and other writing islands. Most recently published: the novel Das Ende der Träume ist aller Anfang.
Existence, love, art
An Impressionistic Fairy Tale
A young jazz pianist with a new instrument in the boot of his car, on a direct route towards his music – and towards exactly the right place for himself. That, at least, is how Binjamin imagines his journey south after his musical surroundings have dissolved into thin air. He has no idea that this journey into a southern country will confront him with his own open identity and hold more than one point of pain. Nor that the surrender of a great love is waiting for him, and the lethargy of a winter sleep.
296 pages · paperback · Königshausen & Neumann · Januar 2026
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Flash Fiction
Many days seem too short to give yourself over completely to reading a novel. Or to writing one. For those moments, and in that mood, very short stories come into being – known as flash fiction or sudden fiction. Unlike a novel, at roughly 600 to 1,300 words they are intense narratives you can take in at a glance. A selection of around thirty of them is planned for publication.
Heidelberg in December. A student has been waiting weeks for a reply from the university, until one Friday evening the pull of a basement pub draws him out of his room.
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A cat with too short a tail, a manor house full of housemates and a window unreachably high above the vine. A story also about tics and belonging.
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About the author
Esam Abou-El Magd was born in Hamburg, grew up on the Baltic coast and lives on the island of Fehmarn. Alongside his literary work he is a non-fiction editor and travel journalist. His novel “Das Ende der Träume ist aller Anfang” was published in 2026 with support from the Hauptstadtkulturfonds.
This is the English section of the site. The complete site, including readings and news, is available in German.
