The Good German: A Novel

Author - Joseph Kanon ... [Goo?] [Posters]

This Hardcover Book item from Henry Holt & Co was reviewed on 11-Dec-2008.

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1) Hardcover Book The Good German: A Novel by Henry Holt & Co. I was really gripped by this book to start with. The descriptions of Berlin, the people, Jake´s yearning for Lena... But after he finds her (all too easily) it all goes downhill. Why does he care so much about the "mystery" ? Why is he prepared to put his own life, and hers, at risk ? I lost interest in the twists and turns so much that when eventually the "villians" were revealed I´d forgotten who they were. A much better book would have simply been about Jake´s search for Lena and her struggle to come to terms with what happened to her and her country. The "mystery" was unnecessary. And one other thing really bothered me (spoiler alert !) - when he first finds her she can´t even bear his touch after her horrors at the hands of the Russians. Then 5 mins later its all la-di-da and this is never mentioned again. Not believable I´m afraid.¤

2) Hardcover Book The Good German: A Novel by Henry Holt & Co. Falls a good editor short of "Worth my time" status. Involved and overlong mystery set in immediately post-war Berlin in 1945 has too many intricate subplots (and subsequent false-ending resolutions) to sustain edge-of-seat emotional levels all the way through, and the great emotional impact of the first few scenes setting up the philosophical discussion of the "good" German is dulled by too many repetitions.

Still, the characters are enjoyable, the dialogue is good, and the plotting strong enough to pass the mystery test of reaching a point where the reader has to finish the book without stopping no matter how late at night. You´ll just wish that point (and the end) had come about 75 pages sooner. Its easy to see why this book is the basis for a soon-to-be released Hollywood treatment with George Clooney in the lead role.¤

3) Hardcover Book The Good German: A Novel by Henry Holt & Co. I read a lot of books as I sure most who post on here do. I have never written a review before but felt compelled after seeing the number of 4 and 5 star ratings on this book. I was aghast to say the least and my faith in Amazon ratings took a big hit. I too had high hopes for this...the setting, the nice maps at the start, the undeniable moral and human dilemmas to be explored. To his credit Kanon does explore these issues in some depth. But it is wrapped in an absurdly convoluted plot, a love story with no conviction whatsoever and dialog that is mostly an aggravation. There is little if any reflection or thought by the characters it is just endless blah, blah, blah. I still have no idea why Jake loved this woman or why she him. Or why he cared about the fate of Tully so much. The book is way too long, the plot twists mostly lame, contrived or confusing. But in the end I just didn´t care what happened to any of them. I was just so glad I got this at a yard sale for 25 cents...that was what it was worth in the end.¤

4) Hardcover Book The Good German: A Novel by Henry Holt & Co. "The Good German" - during Nazi Germany, during the Third Reich? Hard to believe given the historical facts associated with a nation whose genocidal record has tarnished its reputation ever since. "Forgetting" for the Germans and the world is, and rightly so, not an option. So, "who" were they, the "good Germans", "where" were they when it all happened, and "how" did they help when they helped, or did they?

Taking place from July through August 1945 with the Potsdam conference as the general political background, the American reporter Jakob Geismar returns to Berlin searching for Lena, a married woman with whom he had an affair before the war broke out. As he does so, he discovers the dead body of a 23 year old American soldier from Natick, MA and begins an investigation into his death. This not only almost cost him his life, but also uncovers both the tragic complexities into which life threw all German citizens under Nazi dictatorship, and the calculatingly cynical way in which the allied forces used a destroyed Germany to their own advantage.

This action-packed, sensitively written autobiographical thriller-romance places the question "Who is the ´good German´"? on the reader´s mind beginning with page one. It will not be until the very last page, however, that one will find the stunningly surprising answer. Or is it?

Wendy Wagner

¤

5) Hardcover Book The Good German: A Novel by Henry Holt & Co. I enjoyed this in spite of the plot getting out of control. Some of the twists were just twists to fill space I felt. The charaters--Jake and Lena at least--were fairly well developed and believable even if the actions and events were not always very believable. This may sound like a negative review, but as a history lover I found this a great read. I loved the detail about "ordinary life" in such an extra ordinary time and place.¤

6) Hardcover Book The Good German: A Novel by Henry Holt & Co. The bestselling author of Los Alamos returns to 1945. Hitler has been defeated, and Berlin is divided into zones of occupation. Jake Geismar, an American correspondent who spent time in the city before the war, has returned to write about the Allied triumph while pursuing a more personal quest: his search for Lena, the married woman he left behind. When an American soldiers body is found in the Russian zone during the Potsdam Conference, Jake stumbles on the lead to a murder mystery. The Good German is a story of espionage and love, an extraordinary recreation of a city devastated by war, and a thriller that asks the most profound ethical questions in its exploration of the nature of justice, and what we mean by good and evil in times of peace and of war.¤

7) Hardcover Book The Good German: A Novel by Henry Holt & Co. This compelling thriller is both a touching love story and a masterful portrayal of the struggle for geopolitical control of postwar Germany. Network correspondent Jake Geismar, who covered Berlin before the war, has returned to the devastated city, ostensibly to cover the Potsdam Conference but actually to find the woman he loves. Miraculously, Lena Brandt, Jake´s wartime mistress, has survived. However, her mathematician husband is missing, and both the American and Russian intelligence services are hunting him. When the bullet-ridden body of an American soldier washes up on the shores of Potsdam in front of Jake´s eyes just as Truman, Churchill, and Stalin convene the first postwar conference, Jake is plunged into a maelstrom of intrigue, corruption, and betrayal.

A brilliantly evoked portrait of a unique moment in history (the end of one war and the beginning of another), The Good German amply fulfills the promise shown by Joseph Kanon in his two earlier novels, Los Alamos and The Prodigal Spy. --Jane Adams¤

Page Updated: Robert N. Goolsby, 8-Jan-2009, , 020-710-450-781-5X1-NHB-8

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