The group of former soldiers around the protagonist Ernst Birkholz returs from the Western Front to their hometown in Germany where they encounter the changed political, social and economic situation. The war has had an impact on everyone, whether they were on the front or at home. Marriages have failed to to the long absence of the men. Economic hardship affects social relations. Ernst Birkholz tries to find his place in this society, but fails in his original occupation as an elementary school teacher when he discovers that he can no longer teach his puils the old pre-war values that the curriculum requires. Other members of his group look again to join paramilitary units or the regular army where they suppress revolutionary uprisings. Former comrades shoot at each other. With the exception of former soldiers who become involved in the black market or war profiteering, almost all the members of Ernst's group fail to reintegrate; some commit suicide.After a nervous breakdown, Ernst Birkholz finds himself on his own: only of his own volition, with his own strength and with a return to the basic values of life can he achieve a new beginning. Yet, in the final scene of the novel, in which Birkholz encounters a group of young men during a paramilitary exercise, it becomes clear that a new war is already in preparation.

The Road Back shows that every war has long-term consequences for the individual and for society. Like ALL QUIET, the novel points beyond the historical events of the immediate postwar period of the First World War and is just as relevant to contemporary conflicts and their consequences.