Summer or 27 Missing Kisses

It was a summer unlike any other. Sybille promised Mickey one hundred kisses before the autumn. But he only got 73. This is the story of a beautiful, romantic and very upsetting summer, somewhere in the East. The Summer of the Eclipse. Fourteen year-old Sybille arrives in this sleepy little town to spend her vacation with Aunt Martha. By the time she leaves, nothing will be the same. On day one, she falls in love like never before: with Alexander, the astronomer who looks after the old observatory and who is a somewhat lonely widower. He is forty-one and thinks Sybille is too young for love. Equally fast, Alexander’s son Mickey, also fourteen, falls for Sybille. He knows she must belong to him – at all cost – but she doesn’t take him seriously. And Alexander pretends not to see what is happening. Sybille is not to be underestimated. It is as if she has electrified the small town. Everyone feels a mad yearning for love. Illiopolous, the schoolteacher, has a heart attack whilst with his mistress. And Pjotr, the night watchman, has a most unfortunate encounter with a weapons-grade steel ring. The arrival of a French Captain in search of the Sea, and the secret screening of an old Emmanuelle film at the local armaments factory bring things to a head…