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From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Set in 1949, Kerr's excellent fourth novel to feature Bernhard Gunther (after 1991's German Requiem) finds the erstwhile PI managing a failing hotel about a mile from the site of the Dachau concentration camp. After the death of his wife, Kirsten, in a mental hospital, he calls it quits and opens a private detective agency. A series of missing-Nazi cases sets Bernie on a course that becomes increasingly complicated until he's beaten to a near pulp, had his little finger chopped off and is sent to a mysterious private estate to recover. There he's drawn into a nightmare involving the American occupation and the CIA, and soon his life hangs in the balance. Kerr's stylish noir writing makes every page a joy to read ("The little mouth tightened into a smile that was all lips and no teeth, like a newly stitched scar"). Perfectly plotted, the book builds to a satisfying conclusion. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
After a 15-year hiatus during which he's taken readers from the Himalayan snows to Enlightenment England, Kerr returns to the war-torn Germany of his Berlin Noir trilogy with a fourth case for sardonic detective Bernhard Gunther. It is 1949, and fed up with trying to run a hotel next door to Dachau, Gunther hangs out his shingle and in walks a tall blond with marriage on her mind and a missing husband on her conscience. Gunther sets out to track down the renowned sadist, one of many SS spiders able to slip through the Allies' dragnet and find refuge in the Americas. Of course, nothing is quite as it seems, and our knight's detached weltschmerz gets a fresh coat of tarnish. As with his earlier Gunther books, Kerr follows Raymond Chandler's playbook closely, adapting his trademark metaphors with all the subtlety of a goose-step and the restraint of Hermann Goring at a knackwurst-eating contest, to say nothing of the relish. Still, the knockabout action should please most fans of classic hard-boiled mystery and historical espionage. David Wright
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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We were just a stone's throw from what had once been the concentration camp. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
We were just a stone's throw from what had once been the concentration camp. Read the first page
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Most helpful customer reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Unique twist on the detective story,
By
This review is from: The One from the Other: A Bernie Gunther Novel (Paperback)
Kerr takes the hard-boiled detective and puts him on the quite authentically mean streets of post-war Germany, sending his readers on a topsy-turvy ride through what amounts to a quite thrilling and unpredictable ride. Unfortunately the end action turns somewhat on Gunther behaving in a somewhat careless fashion and getting caught, but that's really the only hiccup that ventures near irritation. Kerr's writing should be satisfying enough for those who prefer good style, making this a thriller that the more picky among us can enjoy without too much irritation.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Good, the Bad and Indifferent,
By Ian Gordon Malcomson (Victoria, BC) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME) (TOP 10 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: The One from the Other: A Bernie Gunther Novel (Paperback)
In 1949 Kerr's hero extraordinaire, Bernie Gunther, is no ordinary survivor of the Hitler era. After years of working for the Kripos, the SD and the SS in the Nazis' resettlement of Eastern Europe during WW II, Gunther has come home to start his life again. Jobs are scarce and friends are few, so Gunther turns his talents to doing what he knows best: locating missing persons, an apparent growth industry in a divided post-war Germany. Out of the blue he is hired to investigate the whereabouts of a missing husband who has sinister ties to the Holocaust and is a condemned war criminal in absentia. Along the way, Gunther will become involved in a web of treachery that will call on his best instinctive skills just to stay alive. What keeps him going is his pragmatic sense of how to get close enough to the enemy without being compromised or being caught. In this case his nemesis is a prominent Nazi right-wing group protecting high-ranking members of the Gestapo diectly involved in the Final Solution. Gunther, like in the other chapters of his life, is a man motivated by a subtle combination of self-enlightened preservation and a strong sense of morality. I would recommend this thriller because Kerr encases his story in a very fast-moving plot line that takes the reader into some very hair-raising and chilling adventures from which only a person of incredible wit, charm and savvy to extricate himself. As Gunther becomes further entangled in the web of sinister circumstances, we find him more committed than ever to getting at the truth of the matter, regardless of the cost to limb and life. Nothing fazes this man because he has seen it all before in the horrors of Nazism and the war. Now what is left for him is the job of standing up for what he believes is right and honorable regardless how hard it is to accomplish. Once again, Kerr does a fine job in making all his main and supporting characters come alive with irony, humor and raw emotion. Be prepared for some timely and frank brutality in this tale of one man's single-handedly inspiring efforts to thwart the powers of evil in a world that has grown silently cynical about the past.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brillant series,
By
This review is from: The One from the Other: A Bernie Gunther Novel (Paperback)
Book 4 in the Bernie Gunther seriesThe novel follows the "Berlin Noir Trilogy", with a detective story set in post war Germany. It contains a wealth of historical details spun into a complex plot. It covers the reconstruction period of Germany and its new threat, the rapid growth of communism. The story starts with a prologue set part in Berlin and part in Palestine in the late 30's. Gunther is sent to Palestine with two mandates, one to facilitate a dealing that would allow a Jewish businessman to flee Germany and the other to shadow Nazi intelligence officers. After the introduction that set the tone and is an intricate part of the novel, the action moves to 1949 Germany. Gunther now a struggling hotel owner in Dachau decides to throw in the towel after he is approached and threatened by an individual with a questionable agenda... Soon after the encounter, Gunther decides to return to his former field of expertize, a P.I. with his own business in Munich and at the same time to be close to his wife who is interned at a psychiatric hospital. Looking for missing persons can be a messy business especially in post-war Germany where Nazism still taints the air. Hunting Nazis on the run can make the task even more hazardous and adventure filled. Gunther's experience has taught him, clients are not always forthcoming with all the details and a P.I. can easily find himself caught up in a web of spiralling disasters fighting for his own survival.... Mr. Kerr excels at making his reader's part of the story with first person narration it sometimes feels like Gunther is communicating directly with you. He comes across as a hard boiled, wise- cracking character strongly affected by his past; a past where he has been used as a pawn by multinational plotters in devious games and exploited in political shenanigans. This novel is impeccably plotted; it captures and sheds light on some of the intriguing aspects of post-war Germany while stimulating our interest in a stressful period of history. This is a totalling enthralling story, brilliantly written.
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