Content Warning: This section of the guide discusses torture and police brutality.

Gerta, a 12-year-old resident of East Germany, wakes up on Sunday, August 13, 1961, to a sudden, shocking surprise: Sirens are screaming overheard and the grenzers, the guards in the city, are out patrolling. To the horror of Gerta and her family, “a prison had been built around them as they slept” (1). Gerta wonders how she managed to sleep through the construction of the new massive wall that separates the East from the West in their city and nation. She recalls the warning her teacher shared with their class, that “we might salute the flag of East Germany but it was really Russia we bowed to” (2). With a pang of horror, Gerta recalls that her father and her brother Dominic are in West Berlin and were supposed to be returning in two days. Now, however, with this new wall erected, Gerta doesn’t know how they will get home. Gerta finds her mother sobbing in her older brother Fritz’s arms. It is clear to Gerta that “nothing [will] ever be the same again” (3).