The contemporary habit of laughing at pain may lead to this devastatingly critical short novel being called a comedy. Not that the trials of its grad-student protagonist, Albert, aren't ludicrous. A German enraptured with Italy, he fails ignominiously in his attempts to live in Rome, only to discover a bit of Italy--Sardinia, to be precise--back in Berlin: a harshly lit, sparsely patronized bar in the backroom of which a party of male regulars endlessly gambles. Serving them in back, and Albert and whomever else out front, is beautiful, noncommittal Elena, with whom Albert becomes laconically involved. The relationship persists despite competition for Elena, and when she, having saved enough to set up as a cosmetologist, goes home, Albert goes, too. But it doesn't work out because--and here is the dismal reality that Treichel's cool dissection of his feckless protagonist discloses--Albert doesn't know what love is. He just knows sex, and it isn't enough to build a life around. One closes the book wondering to what extent we aren't all Alberts.