Berlin, A Novel

(Paperback, Main)

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Description

Occupied Berlin, 1945, American Sector. Young Ben inadvertently uncovers the body of a beautiful young woman trapped under a subway station: she has been sexually abused and strangled with a chain. In the scramble to identify the body, the victim is mistaken for an American and a local investigation becomes a matter for the US Military police. In this devastated city the US detective on the case, John Ashburner, and the local German policeman, Klaus Dietrich realise quickly that to solve this apparently motiveless murder they will have to work together. When the bodies of other young women are discovered it becomes clear that this is no isolated act of violence. Daring, atmospheric and taut, Pierre Frei has fashioned a gripping whodunit from the wreckage of Berlin. There is a powerful pulse buried deep in the rubble.

Reviews

Riveting * Daily Telegraph *
One of the best novels I've ever read set in this era * John Lawton, author of Black Out *
'Filled with brilliantly drawn characters, mesmerisingly readable and disturbingly convincing.' * Susanna Yager, Sunday Telegraph *
'Berlin itself, the city and its inhabitants, meticulously observed and depicted... emerges as the true star of the story, flawed, cruel, seductively engaging and all too human. This is its best evocation since Len Deighton's Winter.' * Peter Millar, The Times *

Author Bio

Pierre Frei was born in 1930 and grew up in Berlin. He worked as a freelance foreign correspondent, reporting from Rome, Cairo, New York and London, before retiring to his farm in Wales. Since 1990, Pierre Frei has lived at his chateau in south-west France.