Nadine’s struggle from “below” to “above” leads to the heart of global financial capital, where there is no other way than the collective struggle for dignity, autonomy, and freedom as a woman and sex worker.
In her memoir “Coal,” Martyra Peng weaves snapshots of the existential search for belonging, breaking the law in response to human indifference, and wrestling with one’s own lostness into a suggestive stream of consciousness.
Martyra Peng is one of the most versatile authors of contemporary literature. Her work under changing pseudonyms consists of travel literature, 400 columns, numerous reportages, a highly acclaimed political non-fiction book, blogs, poems, photography and digital art. Her blog “Hooker Republic” was the namesake for the celebrated play “Lulu – the Hooker Republic” by Volker Lösch at the Berlin Schaubühne. Her open letter to the German government “J’accuse” also found its way into the novel “Im Stein” by Clemens Meyer. Until the 1st Corona Lockdown, she was mostly traveling abroad to create distance from Germany. Most recently, the non-fiction book “Sexwork 3.0 – und wie wir Zwangsprostitution verhindern” was published.
Her debut novel, “Kohle,” is the world of a consequent upward struggle in a capitalist environment, where the rebellious outsider Nadine is sorted out as dysfunctional when she shakes the existential foundations of a broken system.
