Toto is a miracle, an orphan of ambiguous gender - conceived on a vodka-fuelled night somewhere in a dead town in a cold summer in East Germany. Mother disappeared in a cloud of alcohol, though not before giving in and ticking the box marked "male". That left Toto out in the world: too fat, too tall, too pure, a gangling giant child who smells of milk. He finds his way to the West, where capitalism is destroying what socialism only allowed to rot. He has two things: one talent, which has a disturbing effect on people, and one love: Kasimir, another orphan, who hates Toto with a hatred that consumes everything. Thank You For This Life is a very angry, very funny novel that tears apart all three Germanys - East, West, and unified - and offers a pitiless vision of the future of western Europe.