Little Red Riding Hood - Jacob Grimm

The women in the castle - Jessica Shattuck

The dark tunnel - Ross Macdonald

All the light we cannot see - Anthony Doerr

All the light we cannot see - Anthony Doerr

Summary: "From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, a stunningly ambitious and beautiful novel about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II. Marie Laure lives with her father in Paris within walking distance of the Museum of Natural History where he works as the master of the locks (there are thousands of locks in the museum). When she is six, she goes blind, and her father builds her a model of their neighborhood, every house, every manhole, so she can memorize it with her fingers and navigate the real streets with her feet and cane. When the Germans occupy Paris, father and daughter flee to Saint-Malo on the Brittany coast, where Marie-Laure's agoraphobic great uncle lives in a tall, narrow house by the sea wall. In another world in Germany, an orphan boy, Werner, grows up with his younger sister, Jutta, both enchanted by a crude radio Werner finds. He becomes a master at building and fixing radios, a talent that wins him a place at an elite and brutal military academy and, ultimately, makes him a highly specialized tracker of the Resistance. Werner travels through the heart of Hitler Youth to the far-flung outskirts of Russia, and finally into Saint-Malo, where his path converges with Marie-Laure. Doerr's gorgeous combination of soaring imagination with observation is electric. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another. Ten years in the writing, All the Light We Cannot See is his most ambitious and dazzling work"-- Provided by publisher.

Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* A novel to live in, learn from, and feel bereft over when the last page is turned, Doerr's magnificently drawn story seems at once spacious and tightly composed. It rests, historically, during the occupation of France during WWII, but brief chapters told in alternating voices give the overall—and long—­narrative a swift movement through time and events. We have two main characters, each one on opposite sides in the conflagration that is destroying Europe. Marie-Louise is a sightless girl who lived with her father in Paris before the occupation; he was a master locksmith for the Museum of Natural History. When German forces necessitate abandonment of the city, Marie-Louise's father, taking with him the museum's greatest treasure, removes himself and his daughter and eventually arrives at his uncle's house in the coastal city of Saint-Malo. Young German soldier Werner is sent to Saint-Malo to track Resistance activity there, and eventually, and inevitably, Marie-Louise's and Werner's paths cross. It is through their individual and intertwined tales that Doerr masterfully and knowledgeably re-creates the deprived civilian conditions of war-torn France and the strictly controlled lives of the military occupiers.High-Demand Backstory: A multipronged marketing campaign will make the author's many fans aware of his newest book, and extensive review coverage is bound to enlist many new fans. Copyright 2014 Booklist Reviews.

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The End - Ian Kershaw

The End: The Defiance and Destruction of Hitler's Germany, 1944-1945 - Kershaw, Ian

Summary: Examines why the Third Reich was able to resist surrender for months after they had clearly lost World War II, drawing on testimony from civilians and former military insiders to discuss the Nazis' psychological power over German citizens.



Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* By September 1918, Germany's military position on the Western Front had severely deteriorated, and political turmoil, military demoralization, and the abdication of the kaiser soon followed. Kershaw, an acclaimed expert on Hitler and the Third Reich, asks why this collapse did not happen to Hitler's Germany during 1944–45, when the military situation clearly was hopeless? Instead, German soldiers and civilians struggled and endured to the bitter end. That question lies at the center of this superb examination of the final defeat of Hitler's tyranny. Military affairs play a part, but Kershaw's narrative concentrates on the mechanics of Nazi administration, civil and military, and efforts to keep the state functioning. The chief functionaries in this task, referred to by Kershaw as the "quadrumvirate," were Himmler, Goebbels, Bormann, and Speer. Kershaw describes in fascinating detail their maneuvers as they jockeyed for power and influence with Hitler. Some of Kershaw's conclusions will be hotly debated. Nevertheless, this is an excellent portrait of the regime's death throes.

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The Boys in the Boat - Daniel Brown

The Boys in the Boat : Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics - Brown, Daniel

Summary: Traces the story of an American rowing team from the University of Washington that defeated elite rivals at Hitler's 1936 Berlin Olympics, sharing the experiences of their enigmatic coach, a visionary boat builder, and a homeless teen rower.



Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* If Jesse Owens is rightfully the most famous American athlete of the 1936 Berlin Olympics, repudiating Adolf Hitler's notion of white supremacy by winning gold in four events, the gold-medal-winning effort by the eight-man rowing team from the University of Washington remains a remarkable story. It encompasses the convergence of transcendent British boatmaker George Pocock; the quiet yet deadly effective UW men's varsity coach, Al Ulbrickson; and an unlikely gaggle of young rowers who would shine as freshmen, then grow up together, a rough-and-tumble bunch, writes Brown, not very worldly, but earnest and used to hard work. Brown (Under a Flaming Sky, 2006) takes enough time to profile the principals in this story while using the 1936 games and Hitler's heavy financial and political investment in them to pull the narrative along. In doing so, he offers a vivid picture of the socioeconomic landscape of 1930s America (brutal), the relentlessly demanding effort required of an Olympic-level rower, the exquisite brainpower and materials that go into making a first-rate boat, and the wiles of a coach who somehow found a way to, first, beat archrival University of California, then conquer a national field of qualifiers, and finally, defeat the best rowing teams in the world. A book that informs as it inspires. Copyright 2012 Booklist Reviews.

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Castles of steel Britain, Germany, and the winning of the Great War at sea - Robert K Massie

Castles of steel Britain, Germany, and the winning of the Great War at sea - Massie, Robert K

Summary: The author continues his study of early twentieth-century military and naval history in an analysis of the confrontation between the two most powerful navies in the world as the British and Germans clashed at sea during World War I. - (Baker & Taylor)

Booklist Reviews
Massie has distinguished himself as a writer who pens enormous narrative histories so engaging that readers, losing themselves in the romance-novel story style, forget that they're reading nearly 1,000 pages of nonfiction. Dovetailing nicely with Dreadnaught (1991), which covers 40 years of British-German politics leading up to the Great War, his latest selection delves into politics by other means as the world's then two most powerful navies attempt to sink each other in the cold North Sea. While our cultural memory of World War I has largely been muddily entrenched in France and Belgium, this book shows that the sea was the war's most vital battleground, at a formative moment, adrift between Admiral Nelson-style high-seas adventure and modern aircraft-dominated naval combat. Yet while clearly well researched regarding technical specifications (gun apertures, water displacement, hull composition), Massie's tome is less a tale of technology and more of what he writes best: biographies of great men and complicated events. In this instance, it's the patient, thoughtful Admiral John Jellicoe, the man Winston Churchill said was "the only man on either side who could lose the war in an afternoon," and his foil, the flamboyant Admiral David Beatty, at sea against the wishes of his clingy aristocratic wife. The key German officers are also covered, and the war's climax at Jutland is as much their story. Unlike the British attempt to eliminate the German High Seas Fleet, this book is a decisive success. ((Reviewed September 15, 2003)) Copyright 2003 Booklist Reviews

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Code name Verity - Elizabeth Wein

Code name Verity - Wein, Elizabeth

Summary: In 1943, a British fighter plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France and the survivor tells a tale of friendship, war, espionage, and great courage as she relates what she must to survive while keeping secret all that she can.



BookPage Reviews

Friendship on the front lines

Dystopia, fantasy and science fiction crowd the YA shelves these days, but Code Name Verity, Elizabeth Wein’s astonishing new World War II novel, is a reminder of the power historical fiction can have in the hands of an accomplished author. Set in Great Britain and occupied France both before and during the war, Code Name Verity is a complex story of friendship and courage.

As the novel opens, “Verity” has been captured by the Gestapo behind enemy lines. “I wanted to be heroic and I pretended I was,” she begins. We soon learn that she has made a deal with her captor to write down every last detail she knows. As she pens her story, he will return her clothes, piece by piece. In exchange, he will get wireless codes, details about airfields in Great Britain and Verity’s own story.

And what a story it is: Writing on whatever paper is given to her, Verity tells the story of her friendship with Maddie Brodatt, who, as a female pilot in the Air Transport Auxiliary, brought Verity to France. As in the tale of Scheherazade, Verity’s captor appreciates her rich storytelling, but in the end he does not hold the power to determine her fate. In the second part of the book, Maddie takes up the suspenseful tale, while the action builds to an unforgettable encounter between the two friends.

Elizabeth Wein is a pilot herself, and her passion for flying and the details of piloting and caring for a small plane add depth and authenticity to this complex, thoroughly researched novel. She also includes a historical note and a bibliography.

As we have learned with books like The Hunger Games, “YA” and “middle grade” may be convenient labels, but they don’t limit the audience for good books. Yes, we can call Code Name Verity a young adult book. But this sophisticated and compelling novel is likely to find a home on the shelves of teens and adults alike.
Copyright 2012 BookPage Reviews.

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The teleportation accident - Ned Beauman

The teleportation accident - Beauman, Ned

Summary: "In the declining Weimar Republic, Egon Loeser works as a stage designer for New Expressionist theatre. His hero is the greatest set designer of the seventeenth century, Adriano Lavicini, who devised the so-called Teleportation Device for the whisking ofactors from one scene to another-a miracle, until the thing malfunctioned, causing numerous deaths and perhaps summoning the devil himself. Apolitical in a dangerous time, sex-driven in a dry spell, Loeser leaves the tired scene in Berlin in pursuit of the lubricious Adele Hitler (no relation), who couldn't care less about him. Heading first to Paris and then to Los Angeles, he finds his entire tired Berlin social circle reconstituted in exile, under the patronage of a crime writer and his possibly philandering wife. He also finds himself uncomfortably close to a string of murders at Caltech, where a physicist, assisted by Adele herself, is trying to develop a device for honest-to-God teleportation.Following his breathtaking debut, Boxer, Beetle, Ned Beauman ups the ante, creating in The Teleportation Accident a marvelous mash-up of historical fiction, L.A. noir, science fiction, and satire, and proving himself a star on the rise"-- Provided by publisher.

Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* Egon Loeser, an avant-garde set designer in Weimar-era Berlin, is obsessed with a girl named Adele Hitler (no relation), who, like most other girls, won't sleep with him, forcing Egon to spend his evenings with the alluring women portrayed in a pornographic novel called Midnight at the Nursing Academy. Then there is his current project, designing the sets for an Expressionist production of a play about Renaissance set designer Lavicini, whose so-called teleportation device (think "Beam me up, Scotty") exploded in a crowded Italian theater. Loeser hopes to re-create the teleportation device for a spectacular finale that will gain him the respect he craves from his fellow dissolute artists. Naturally, it all goes bad. Fraulein Hitler hooks up with Egon's worst enemy, and the teleportation device explodes, well, prematurely, forcing Egon to escape to Paris and from there to California. Tragically, he loses his favorite book en route. Egon can run, but he can't hide. Adele turns up in California, too, working for a wacky scientist who appears to be experimenting with something very like a teleportation device. There is so much going on in this truly bizarre novel—everything from slapstick to noir to steampunk—that discombobulated readers may feel as though they've fallen down a narrative wormhole. But what a wormhole! Beauman, a kind of comic version of Nick Harkaway in Angelmaker (2012), gives us an apolitical German in 1930s Berlin who is indifferent to Nazis but despises Bertolt Brecht and who hasn't had sex in three years but still pines for a girl named Hitler. It makes no sense, but it's brilliant. Copyright 2012 Booklist Reviews.

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The perfect Nazi - Martin P. Davidson

The perfect Nazi: uncovering my grandfather's secret past and how Hitler seduced a generation - Davidson, Martin P.

Summary: Traces the author's research into his family's history after learning at his mother's deathbed that his formidable grandfather had been a Nazi SS officer, describing his discoveries of how his grandfather embodied the persona of an ideal soldier whose fortunes reflected the rise and fall of the Nazi party. - (Baker & Taylor)


Booklist Reviews
As a film editor with the BBC, Davidson persuaded his employer to broadcast all two hours and 20 minutes of Leni Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will, in response to public debate surrounding the filmmaker's autobiography. He had no idea at the time that Bruno Langbehn, his maternal grandfather, had likely been "one of those grim-faced SS hoplites marching in the film's endless formations." His family had always been tight-lipped about his grandfather's past, and he could never forget the provocatively unrepentant comments old Bruno would make after a few drinks. But it wasn't until after Bruno's death that the whole truth began to emerge: Davidson's grandfather had been a dedicated Nazi, an "early joiner" who rose through the ranks to become a decorated SS officer (and colleague of Adolf Eichmann). Scouring records and photographs and visiting the places where Bruno lived, Davidson pieces together his grandfather's past, and through this biography sheds some light on the mechanisms of Nazi ideology. Though an investigation of this sort could easily succumb to sensationalism, Davidson treads carefully and remains candid about the discomfort his research causes him. The result is an engrossing and deeply personal narrative that raises as many questions as it seems to answer. Copyright 2011 Booklist Reviews.

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A woman in Berlin - Anonymous

A woman in Berlin: eight weeks in the conquered city: a diary - Anonymous

Summary: A wartime journal by a reporter living through the Russian occupation of Berlin includes her observations of survival under harsh conditions; the mass rapes endured by the city's women; and the corruption of Berlin's citizens. - (Baker & Taylor)


Booklist Reviews
The author of this diary was a 34-year-old journalist, now deceased, who consistently refused to reveal her identity publicly. She spoke some Russian and seemed liberal in outlook. Her chronicle was first published in 1953; after remaining dormant, it was republished 50 years later in Germany. This stunning account covers the period from late April to mid-June 1945, beginning with the massive Soviet bombardment of Berlin and ending with the opening weeks of the Soviet occupation. The author is a keen observer of the ironies, even the absurdities, of a collapsing society, but this is a work of great power. At times, one can virtually smell the fear as people cower in basements as the bombardment intensifies. When Russian troops arrive, they are, at first, comically playful as they seem intent on accumulating watches and bicycles. Then the rapes begin and there are scenes of casual but horrifying brutality. The author recounts her own rape with an unsettling detachment. This is a devastating and rare glimpse at ordinary people who struggle to survive. ((Reviewed July 2005)) Copyright 2005 Booklist Reviews.

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The sorrows of young Werther - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The sorrows of young Werther - Goethe, Johann Woflgang von

Summary: For more than two centuries the very title of this book has evoked the sensitivity of youth, the suffering of the artist, the idea of a hero too full of love to live. When it was first published in Germany, in 1774, The Sorrows of Young Werther created a sensation. Banned and condemned but embraced - especially by the young - it has continued to captivate.

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