This book attracted me because of its premise — a retelling of the Rip van Winkle tale, referred to a number of times in the text. Rather than falling asleep for twenty years, the protagonist (Hans) leaves Dresden and his teenage sweetheart when he’s conscripted into the Wehrmacht during the Second World War. After thirteen years being held as a prisoner of war in the Soviet Union he returns to find that not only has the city changed beyond all measure, but the political situation and the whole culture he left has changed, too.

The book is in two parts and for me it took too long to get to the interesting part. Hans’s developing relationship with Elise didn’t hold my attention for that long and a lot of it felt irrelevant knowing what was to come. Once Hans returned and faced the demons of what had happened both to his city and to the people he loved, and had to come to terns with a new political situation that was hostile to him, the book became much more interesting and there was much more of a sene of purpose about it. It got better as it went on and the ending had a twist that I genuinely didn’t expect — so, hats off to the author for that!

That said, the book isn’t without its issues. To my disappointment it lacked any real sense of place— something that’s crucial in a location-dependent book such as this. I don’t mean that it lacked detail, because it didn’t: the descriptions of the cityscape before and after Hans’s exile were, as far as I can tell, immaculate. The problem was in the telling. Party it’s because it’s an American book written in American English and had no nod to its central European setting. Even a small touch, such as the odd word in German (such as a character addressing their mother as mutti rather than mom) might have lifted it a little and made a difference.

I hate to say it, but the main problem I have with this is that the writing was pedestrian at best and that made it pretty hard to read at times. The story, as I’ve said, is thrilling at points (certainly once it gets going) but I always felt I was very distant from it. Neither the characters nor the place (and I’ve recently been to Dresden and read a lot of eye-witness accounts of what happened there) felt real to me and even the graphic (and accurate) descriptions of the horrors of the firestorm failed to touch my emotions as they ought to. It was all telling and almost no showing and I’m sorry to say that in many places I found it dull. I thought the dialogue was clunky and I never really felt invested in the characters. I didn’t feel their fear or their pain; I was’t shocked or angry as I read. I just read, without emotion and that’s definitely not what I would expect from a story dealing with such traumatic events.

I think that’s a pity because, as I say, this offered a great story and a really interesting premise. But I’m sorry: I just think it could have been delivered a whole lot better. 

(I’ve given it three stars but I think if I could I would actually give it 2.5.)

Thank to Netgalley and the author for a copy of this book in return for an honest review.

An interesting novel with a realistic insight to trauma. The descriptions of Dresden before and after the bombings are very well researched. The characters were all rather cliché (the typical Nazi, Stasi, social status differences) and lacked depth. What really annoyed me though was that nearly 50% of the novel focused on how Hans and Elise, two teenagers, met before the war. This was quite boring for me and left me wondering whether the novel had been written for young adults. No need to say that only the second half of the book got my attention. Shame.
I received a digital copy of this novel from NetGalley and I have voluntarily written an honest review.

This book was a 3.5 for me. The characters and storyline held a lot of appeal. It felt like it had the makings of an epic and it just fell short. There are these huge events: the bombing of Dresden, ten years in a soviet camp, and living in East Germany and I was left feeling like I didn’t really get enough depth on any of them.