East Germany Fiction

A City Divided. A Love Forbidden. A Wall That Changes Everything. Berlin, 1961. In a city caught between freedom and fear, childhood pen pals Lieselotte and Wolfgang reunite by chance on the bustling streets of West Berlin. What begins as a spark of memory ignites into a powerful, undeniable love—one that defies the political lines drawn to keep them apart. Lieselotte lives in the West, where freedom is fragile and watched from the shadows. Wolfgang, raised under the iron grip of East Berlin, finds his world increasingly stifled by the watchful eye of the Stasi and the slow erosion of ...

Before the legend of Department 89, there were the people who built it in blood Long before Germany’s most secret intelligence unit existed, four future agents lived through the chaos of the Cold War, betrayal, and political conspiracy — experiences that would forge them into the ruthless operatives of this explosive German espionage thriller series. Sophie Decker. A homeless survivor of abuse and the brutal DDR streets. She joins the army, becoming a fearless female assassin in the making — a soldier who fights her own private wars long before joining Department 89. Wolfgang Schmitz....

Named a Best Mystery & Suspense Book of the Year by BookPage and CrimeReads “A steamy, thrilling crime story” (The Washington Post) from New York Times bestselling author Joseph Kanon set in pre-World War II Shanghai, where glamour and squalor exist side by side and murder is just the cost...

In a country where loyalty is enforced and obedience is demanded, one man dares to stand tall. Heinz Krügel grows up in a coal-dust village where football is the only escape from poverty. As a boy, he studies the game from the steps of his crumbling home—learning not by playing, but by watching. And in that same street lives Lena Baumann, the girl with the charcoal-stained fingers who sketches him from behind lace curtains. She sees what others miss: the way he reads space, the way he leads without a word, and the fire inside him that refuses to be extinguished. But childhood promises ...

Three generations (grandmother, mother, son) of polar bears are famous as both circus performers and writers in East Germany. They are polar bears who move in human society, stars of the ring and of the literary world. In chapter one, the grandmother matriarch in the Soviet Union accidentally writes a best-selling autobiography.

In the summer of 1961, a wall of barbed wire goes up quickly in the dead of night, officially dividing Berlin. Luisa Voigt lives in West Berlin, but her grandmother lives across the border and is now trapped inside the newly isolated communist country of East Germany. Desperate to rescue her grandmother and aware of the many others whose families have been divided, Luisa joins a secret spy network, risking her life to help bring others through a makeshift underground tunnel to West Germany. Their work is dangerous, and not everyone will successfully escape or live to see freedom.

Hans Unterwald doesn’t pull triggers — he pulls strings When the Berlin Wall falls, one man sees opportunity in the wreckage. Ex–Luftwaffe pilot Hans Unterwald spent the Cold War uncovering traitors inside his own ranks — until the system paid him to keep quiet. Now he sells silence for a living. In the chaos of a reunited Germany, Unterwald becomes the Fixer: the man politicians call when scandals need to vanish and enemies need to disappear. But when he seizes a cache of stolen Stasi files, he discovers the deadliest currency in Europe isn’t money — it’s information. And ...

Six family-friendly short stories connected by a common theme of Cold War spies and their families. Stories One Through Four take place in East and West Germany, Story Five (Unexpected Trouble) takes place in North America, and Story Six (Passing the Baton) goes back to Germany, but connects the stories together. The characters are all fictional, but the geography and the history are at least loosely based on what happened in real life. Please join me in a view of what things might have been like during the Cold War!

New York Times Notable Book * Named one of NPR and Wall Street Journal's Best Books of the Year * The acclaimed author of The Good German “deftly captures the ambience” (The New York Times Book Review) of postwar East Berlin in his “thought-provoking, pulse-pounding” (Wall Street...

History remembers walls. This book remembers the shadows behind them. For those who lived behind the Iron Curtain, fear was not an emotion. It was an environment—like air, or gravity. Invisible, constant, and inescapable. When the Second World War ended, East Germany promised rebirth. Factories reopened, stadium lights flickered to life, and slogans painted on every surface declared a new dawn for the working class. But beneath the posters and parades, another structure was quietly rising—one not built of brick and steel, but of whispers, files, and obedience. That structure had a name:...

Turn of the Key: A novel of the Cold War and family secrets revealed Can she find the missing pieces of her early life? 1980, Washington DC: Margaret Richardson dreams about an emaciated little girl in torn and dirty clothes who speaks a language she cannot understand. Margaret discovers that she is that little girl born in the turmoil and destruction of World War II Germany. But who was Margaret's mother and why did she abandon her?Margaret finds two documents and a newspaper clipping in a secret compartment in her father's desk. A woman in the 1944 newspaper article standing next to ...

“Happy, sad and all emotions!” Dull and predictable English retiree, Frank, gets more adventure than he bargained for when he sets off on a road trip across 1980s Europe hoping to shake up his mundane life. Be transported with him to Berlin as the Berlin Wall falls, to Nice in the South of France, and to Naples and Sicily. In East Germany, Frank finds getting in much easier than getting out. In France, Frank meets the exotic Delphine who persuades him to cast a lifetime of caution to the wind. He's having the time of his life on the Cote d'Azur until things get complicated and the two ...

This powerful Cold War novel tells the story of two cousins, one German and the other an American Army brat, as they navigate the political and social turmoil that threatens their friendship and ends in the abrupt rise of the Berlin Wall–which may separate them forever. Drew is an army brat, a...

A tense, mesmerizing novel about memory, privacy, fear, and what happens when our past catches up with us. After a decade living in England, Jeremy O'Keefe returns to New York, where he has been hired as a professor of German history at New York University. Though comfortable in his new life...

Als der ehemalige Betriebskindergarten gut zehn Jahre nach der Wende verkauft werden soll, weckt das den verloren geglaubten Gemeinschaftsgeist in der alten Belegschaft - und völlig unvermittelt ergibt sich eine Chance, den Lauf der Dinge zu ändern. Nach der Abwicklung des Brandenburger Chemiewerks im Jahr 1994 sind Erika und ihr Mann Mitte 50 und schlagartig arbeitslos. Ihre Tochter kehrt ihnen den Rücken und zieht nach Berlin.

She fled the enemy with only a knife, a map, and a promise... In the brutal winter of 1944, sixteen-year-old Marianne knows the Russian army is closing in on her East Prussian village. Rumors of atrocities are growing louder each day. Determined not to become another victim, she disguises herself as a boy and escapes westward—alone, starving, and terrified. What follows is a harrowing journey through war-torn landscapes, where Marianne faces hunger, cold, danger—and the unthinkable. Her only hope is a promise made to her childhood friend Ferdinand, who also fled eastward, hiding from ...

Eine Familie zerrieben zwischen den Fronten, zerrissen durch die Grenze, verbunden durch die Liebe. Sommer 1987, in einer Hinterhauswohnung in Prenzlauer Berg: Die achtjährige Ella wohnt mit ihren beiden kleinen Brüdern, den Eltern und Großeltern nah an der Grenze, doch davon bekommt sie wenig mit. Ihr Leben besteht aus orangenen Ziehbadewannen, Sommertagen an der Datsche und Balkonen, die von Häusern fallen. Bis ein Urlaub an der ungarisch-österreichischen Grenze ihrer Kindheit ein jähes Ende setzt und die Familie für immer zerreißt. Zwanzig Jahre später führt das Tagebuch ihrer Mutter Ella zurück nach Berlin.

Eine absolut komische und absurde Geschichte über den Genossen Soldaten Henrik! Dem Leser wird die Zeit der DDR vorgestellt, während welcher Henrik zur Nationalen Volksarmee muss, was für ihn eine 18-monatige Trennung von Familie, Freunden und vor allem seiner ersten großen Liebe Eva bedeutet. In der Kaserne angekommen trifft er auf die verschiedensten Charaktere: den lieben aber tölpelhaften Mischke, den empfindsamen Traubewein, den rebellischen Krüger und den beflissenen Stadlmair. Doch eines haben sie gemeinsam: keiner von ihnen will dort sein.

John le Carrés ikoniske koldkrigsroman fra 1963. Alec Leamas er leder af den britiske efterretningstjeneste i Berlin og ser med egne øjne sin sidste agent blive likvideret ved Muren. Leamas er en sand professionel, en mester i den livsfarlige metier, styret af en særegen sammenbidt vilje til retfærdighed og - når det kræves - til gengældelse. og det gør det her. Leamas vil have hævn over den østtyske efterretningschef Mundt. Som sin sidste mission vil han gennemføre en dristig kontraspionageintrige.