Harris, Robert "Fatherland"

Harris, Robert "Fatherland" - 1992

What an awful thought. Hitler resp. the Nazis had won the war. I always say, the Germans didn't lose the war, that were the Nazis. The Germans effectively won the war. In this book (and in various others, like my favourite "The Children's War") we can all see why.

The story itself concentrates on one particular case. A policemen who is not a fan of the Nazis but still has to wear their uniform for his job, tries to find the secret behind a murder. And with that, he could transform the whole world.

We need people like that everywhere, people who don't just blindly follow some dicatators, even if it is an advantage for them.

I think, right now is the right time to read this book again. Right now, where the Right is on the rise in many, many countries. Too many, if you ask me. How can people forget what it was? Even if you haven't lived during the war, most of us haven't, lets be honest. My parents would have been ninety had they still lived. And they were five when the Nazis were elected, so anyone responsible for the regime must be about a hundred. Not many of them alive anymore. But we have to remember what our parents or grandparents told us and see where we are heading if we elect those idiots that tell us the foreigners are our enemies. Nope, those who want to abolish our hard-earned democracy are.

We should all be happy that the war ended the way it did, this book shows us what could have been had it been different.

From the back cover:

"April 1964.

The naked body of an old man floats in a lake on the outskirts of Berlin. In one week it will be Adolf Hitler’s 75th birthday. A terrible conspiracy is starting to unravel…

What if Hitler had won?"

Stroyar, J.N. "Becoming Them"

Stroyar, J.N. "Becoming Them" (The Children's War Book 3) - 2017

Ten years ago, I read "The Children's War" and "A Change of Regime", one of the best books I ever read and still my favourite. As a German, having to live with the consequences of one of the most terrible wars ever, I have always asked myself what would have happened if the Nazis had won the war. We all would have lost, that's for sure. J.N. Stroyar has brought these thoughts to paper and painted a very vivid picture in her first two books. Then, one day, I learned there was a third one. Wow! I couldn't believe it. I was lucky to find a copy. I have no idea why these books don't get reprinted, I know so many people who would love to read it.

So, I finally found a copy. It had been ten years since I read the first two books. Would I remember enough to jump right back in? Looks like I didn't even have to. The author was so clever to include a ten pages of summary in the front where she retells the story for those who want to review what was in the first books and it might even be enough for those who never read the first ones. I think this should be obligatory for any sequel to any book. Makes reading the follow-up so much easer.

They say on the back cover "the long awaited finale". I didn't even know there was to be a finale. I didn't even know there would be a third book. Mainly, I think, because so little is known about the author. All I know is that she's a US physisict who used to live in German (Frankfurt, I believe) and now lives partly in London and partly in the USA. And that she won the "Sidewise Award" in 2001, an annual award for "Alternate History". She doesn't even have a Wikipedia page. So, I haven't seen anywhere that she was writing a third story.

In this final book of the trilogy, we see how everything gets together in the end, how the long and arduous underground work finally leads to the end of the Nazi party. But not without many, many difficulties first. This third book is just as fascinating, exciting and thrilling as the first two. I hope many people will be able to read it.

I also hope that the author is going to write more books.

Quote from Wikipedia:
"The Bradenton Herald described The Children's War as 'a brutal look at what might have been and a reminder of the price of freedom.'"
So very exact and true.

From the back cover:

"The long awaited finale of The Children’s War is presented in Becoming Them. Drawn from genuine historical incidents and people, both from the past and the present, the story examines the psychology of war, torture, and resistance, of guilt and innocence.

Set in a world sixty years after the conquest of Europe by Nazi Germany, the resistance movement continues its struggle for freedom, passing their war on from generation to generation. Peter Halifax, one-time member of the English Underground, has just been released from prison and now works with his assassin wife Zosia Król in Berlin under the direction of her brother, Ryszard, who, as his alter-ego Colonel Richard Traugutt, is second in command of the Third Reich. Together they attempt to collapse the Nazi Party and reform the Reich from within.

The story begins in London where Peter has been sent to liaise with the English Underground as a member of the newly formed Nichtdeutsch Council, but instead he becomes the target of an assassination attempt. It is only one indication of the growing chaos and violence in the Reich as the population becomes disenchanted with the dithering leadership of their new Fuhrer, Josef Frauenfeld.

As a member of the Nichtdeutsch Council, Zosia attempts to organize the various opposition factions into a coherent movement while struggling to raise her family, carefully keeping her three children away from Berlin high society where Magdalena, who is Elspeth’s and Peter’s daughter, might be recognized. She also maintains contact with her base in the Carpathian mountains and undertakes jobs for them that lead her into ever more questionable actions.

Richard Traugutt, as special advisor to the Fuhrer, works to change the laws of the Reich to give more rights and freedoms to its subjects, but he is endlessly stymied by Frauenfeld who has fallen under the sway of Richard’s enemies, the Lederman brothers, who are staunch supporters of the racial categorizations of Reich law. In an attempt to shatter Frauenfeld’s illusions about the rigid class system, Richard maneuvers Peter, who is still classified as subhuman, into the highest tiers of Berlin society, into re-establishing his illicit relationship with Elspeth Vogel, and even into befriending the Fuhrer in the hopes of causing a cultural clash that will force Frauenfeld to re-evaluate his adherence to Nazi philosophy. Traugutt’s plan falls foul of all his directives, and his determination to follow his own personal agenda for reform, ruthlessly manipulating people and events to maximize their effectiveness – whatever the personal cost – results in constant conflict with his allies and a withdrawal of support from the Underground hierarchy.

As their plots unfold and the Resistance begins to tear itself apart, the past comes back to haunt them all, sowing distrust and fear among the conspirators. With each passing month they more and more come to resemble that which they hate. Their loyalties are frayed, their motives are questioned, trusted comrades turn traitor, and their enemies grow in power. Time is running out.

As background to the story, Becoming Them contains a complete summary of both The Children’s War and A Change of Regime."

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2021.

Palma, Felix J. "The Map of Chaos"

Palma, Felix J. "The Map of Chaos" (Spanish: El mapa del caos) - 2014

I usually wait until a book is available in paperback, lighter, cheaper, takes up less space etc. And translations, I prefer to read them translated into German though I was tempted to get this one in English when I found a reduced copy with only some minor damages in a German bookshop.

Anyway, I was glad I did. After reading the first two editions of this trilogy, "The Map of Time" and "The Map of the Sky", I was eagerly awaiting the third part.

Now, I'm not a huge fan of science fiction and these books are based on H.G. Wells' novels. But Félix J. Palma has created some marvels. In this novel, he doesn't just travel in time, he travels in worlds, parallel worlds that are slight copies of each other. The idea that there might be another world with exactly the same people in it but different destinies is quite amazing. The ideas for the story are so unique, I don't think I've ever read anything like that.

Whilst he based "The Map of Time" on "The Time Machine" and "The Map of the Sky" on "War of the Worlds", this last part is based on "The Invisible Man". I shall have to read all three of them, just to see where this author got his inspiration.

"Chaos is inevitable". That's the theme of the book and there is a lot of chaos to be found. We visit Victorian London, meet lots of real-life characters from the time like the prolific writers H.G. Wells, Lewis Carroll and Arthur Conan Doyle as well as some good old acquaintances from the former books.

A marvellous conclusion of a fantastic trilogy.

I know the author has written more books and I hope they will all be translated one day.

From the back cover:

"From the New York Times bestselling author of The Map of Time and The Map of the Sky, the final installment in the award-winning trilogy that The Washington Post called 'a big, genre-bending delight'.

When the person he loves most dies in tragic circumstances, the mysterious protagonist of The Map of Chaos does all he can to speak to her one last time. A session with a renowned medium seems to offer the only solution, but the experience unleashes terrible forces that bring the world to the brink of disaster. Salvation can only be found in The Map of Chaos, an obscure book that he is desperate to uncover. In his search, he is given invaluable help by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Lewis Carroll, and of course by H. G. Wells, whose Invisible Man seems to have escaped from the pages of his famous novel to sow terror among mankind. They alone can discover the means to save the world and to find the path that will reunite the lovers separated by death.

Proving once again that he is 'a master of ingenious plotting' (Kirkus Reviews), Félix J. Palma brings together a cast of real and imagined literary characters in Victorian-Age London, when spiritualism is at its height. The Map of Chaos is a spellbinding adventure that mixes impossible loves, nonstop action, real ghosts, and fake mediums, all while paying homage to the giants of science fiction.

It won the 2015 Ignotus Awards for Best Spanish Novel."

Sansom, C.J. "Dominion"

Sansom, C.J. (Christopher John) "Dominion" - 2011

"The Children's War" by J.N. Stroyar is probably my favourite book ever. Therefore, I was quite pleased to find this book that tells another story about what would or could have happened, had the Nazis won the war. I have always said I am glad they didn't, even though some of my foreign friends might think I shouldn't be thankful Germany lost the war. But that is wrong. Germany didn't lose the war, the Nazis did and that was for the good of everyone, not just the foreigners. My parents who were still quite little when they were elected have been telling me stories that go hand in hand with these kinds of books.

Therefore, well done, Christopher John Sansom. In this novel, we assume that there wasn't a WWII, just a short war in 1939 and that the Nazis won and carried on ruling the world. And what an awful world that was. Just as bad as living in Germany during those years when you weren't a Nazi. You had to hide your feelings from everyone around you, just in case they disagreed with you and reported you. My grandfather made the mistake to warn everyone before the elections and was given quite a hard time afterwards. Luckily, they lived quite remote and he could hide in the nearby bogs.

Back to the book, we follow different kinds of people in Nazi ruled Britain, the followers, the resistance, the Jews, and even some German military guys who come to "help out". We get to know them quite well and follow their stories, their hopes and their dreams.

It was extremely interesting for me to read all this, imagining my grandparents in a time like that. Maybe someday I will come upon a great book about the German resistance in those hard times.

Best quote:
"Whenever a party tells you national identity matters more than anything else in politics, that nationalism can sort out all the other problems, then watch out, because you’re on a road that can end with fascism."

From the back cover:

"1952. Twelve years have passed since Churchill lost to the appeasers, and Britain surrendered to Nazi Germany after Dunkirk. As the long German war against Russia rages on in the east, the British people find themselves under dark authoritarian rule: the press, radio and television are controlled; the streets patrolled by violent auxiliary police and British Jews face ever greater constraints. There are terrible rumours too about what is happening in the basement of the German Embassy at Senate House. Defiance, though, is growing.

In Britain, Winston Churchill's Resistance organisation is increasingly a thorn in the government's side. And in a Birmingham mental hospital an incarcerated scientist, Frank Muncaster, may hold a secret that could change the balance of the world struggle forever. Civil Servant David Fitzgerald, secretly acting as a spy for the Resistance, is given by them the mission to rescue his old friend Frank and get him out of the country. Before long he, together with a disparate group of Resistance activists, will find themselves fugitives in the midst of London’s Great Smog; as David’s wife Sarah finds herself drawn into a world more terrifying than she ever could have imagined. And hard on their heels is Gestapo Sturmbannfuhrer Gunther Hoth, brilliant, implacable hunter of men . . .

At once a vivid, haunting re-imagining of 1950s Britain, a gripping, humane spy thriller and a poignant love story - with Dominion, C.J. Sansom once again asserts himself as the master of the historical novel."

Fforde, Jasper "Shades of Grey. The Road to High Saffron"

Fforde, Jasper "Shades of Grey. The Road to High Saffron" - 2009

A dystopian novel about a future where colour perception rules the world. I like colours, I like Jasper Fforde's style I read a few of his "Thursday Next" books (The Eyre Affair, Lost in a Good Book), so I couldn't resist when I saw this book even though the title surprised me a little. When my son saw it on my reading pile, he looked at it curiously and I said "It's not 50 Shades of Grey", and he laughed and said "I wouldn't think you'd step that low". Oh, my kids know me so well. ;)

Anyway, I think dystopian novels (or "disturbian" as my husband likes to call them) are great. They show our society in a different way. What kind of fears are there, how do we imagine the world would look like if some of them came true. Or something else happened that made us give up the ways we live now.

In this case, Something (always capitalized) happens and the world changes, the people change. Everyone is only able to see certain kinds of colour and even there is a difference in how well they perceive "their" colour. Families even have their last names showing what colour they can see, like our hero Eddie Russett, who - obviously - belongs to the Reds. Then there are the deMauves, the Ochres, the Magnetas, Mr. Yewberry, Mrs. Lapis-Lazuli, etc. The Greys don't see any colours and are therefore just given a number.

But here's the thing, people manage to get racism even into this, you are not judged by the colour of your skin but by the colour you can see. The ultra-violets are the highest, the Reds come second last, just above the Greys.

What I liked about this novel is not just the author's style, he does write interestingly and his novels always contain a lot of humour, but the way it makes you think about how we really perceive this world. That is my favourite part not just about this novel but of any dystopian one.

From the back cover:

"Hundreds of years in the future, after the Something that Happened, the world is an alarmingly different place. Life is lived according to The Rulebook and social hierarchy is determined by your perception of colour.
Eddie Russett is an above average Red who dreams of moving up the ladder by marriage to Constance Oxblood. Until he is sent to the Outer Fringes where he meets Jane - a lowly Grey with an uncontrollable temper and a desire to see him killed.
For Eddie, it's love at first sight. But his infatuation will lead him to discover that all is not as it seems in a world where everything that looks black and white is really shades of grey . . .
If George Orwell had tripped over a paint pot or Douglas Adams favoured colour swatches instead of towels . . . neither of them would have come up with anything as eccentrically brilliant as Shades of Grey."

According to Wikipedia: "Fforde's books contain a profusion of literary allusions and wordplay, tightly scripted plots, and playfulness with the conventions of traditional genres. His works usually contain elements of metafiction, parody, and fantasy."

Vermes, Timur "Look who's back"

Vermes, Timur "Look who's back" (Er ist wieder da) - 2012

I have always wondered what my grandmother, who died in 1982, would think if she came back to earth today. What would she think of people walking around in a town, obviously talking to themselves. What would be her idea when she saw an internet shop? What sort of things are they selling there? And what are these weird little black or sometimes colourful boxes everyone stares at all the time.

Timur Vermes went one step further. He brought the worst person back ever, Adolf Hitler. What would he think about today? Hopefully he'd be disappointed in the fact that his dream did not come true, that nobody believes in his "values" anymore. The author describes it in a somewhat funny, satirical way and even though I like the idea of this, reading it gave me a sort of shiver, a strange sort of feeling.

I hope he would see a Germany where foreigners or any nationality, religion, and colour, are welcome. Were gay people are treated the same way as everybody else. Where nobody minds the gypsies. Or someone with a different kind of political idea. Because the Nazis discriminated against anyone belonging to any of these groups. And many more. My own grandfather was called a communist, only because he wasn't a Nazi and had said so pretty openly.

I remember thinking about this a couple of years ago when our new government consisted of a female (!) divorced and remarried chancellor (replacing one who had been married four times), a gay vice president and foreign minister, an Asian born finance minister, a handicapped finance minister, and several women. Hitler would not have approved of any of them and I am happy that none of his "values" matter anymore today, that their knowledge and expertise mean more to us than their private lives.

I usually enjoy alternate history books, after all, my favourite one is "The Children's War" and "A Change of Regime" by J.N. Stroyar where we just assume the Nazis had won the war. But in that story we all learn how bad that would have been for everyone.

Still, this novel is well written and keeps you in suspense. I'm still not too happy with it.

From the back cover:

"Berlin, Summer 2011. Adolf Hitler wakes up on a patch of open ground, alive and well. Things have changed – no Eva Braun, no Nazi party, no war. Hitler barely recognises his beloved Fatherland, filled with immigrants and run by a woman.

People certainly recognise him, albeit as a flawless impersonator who refuses to break character. The unthinkable, the inevitable happens, and the ranting Hitler goes viral, becomes a YouTube star, gets his own T.V. show, and people begin to listen. But the Führer has another programme with even greater ambition – to set the country he finds a shambles back to rights.

Look Who’s Back stunned and then thrilled 1.5 million German readers with its fearless approach to the most taboo of subjects. Naive yet insightful, repellent yet strangely sympathetic, the revived Hitler unquestionably has a spring in his step."

Roth, Philip "The Ghost Writer"

Roth, Philip "The Ghost Writer" - 1979

Why I have not read any books by this extraordinary writer is a big mystery to me.

What can I say, I really loved the book. I wondered whether this book was partly autobiographical, it certainly had tendencies that sounded like it. I liked the alternate history part, a genre I cherish a lot.

A young writer meets an older writer, his writing hero. And there he meets an interesting young girl who seems to have a fascinating past. That is the basic story. However, it's the way Philip Roth tells the story that makes it interesting, makes you want to know all about Nathan Zuckerman, the young author, and his life, makes you want to read the whole series.

Within just 180 pages, Philip Roth manages to give an overview of Jewish history, the Holocaust, Anne Frank's diary, and life in the United States in the fifties, especially the situations of the Jews at the time.

If you like the first sentences: "It was the last daylight hour of a December afternoon more than twenty years ago--I was twenty-three, writing and publishing my first short stories, and like many a Bildungsroman hero before me, already contemplating my own massive Bildungsroman--when I arrived at his hideaway to meet the great man. The clapboard farmhouse was at the end of an unpaved road twelve hundred feet up in the Berkshires, yet the figure who emerged from the study to bestow a ceremonious greeting wore a gabardine suit, a knitted blue tie clipped to a white shirt by an unadorned silver clasp, and well-brushed ministerial black shoes that made me think of him stepping down from a shoeshine stand rather than from the high altar of art", you will like the whole book. His writing is beautiful.

I will definitely read more by this author, especially since I have ordered the second one in the series (Zuckerman Unbound) right away at my library already.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"Exactly twenty years ago, Philip Roth made his debut with Goodbye, Columbus, a book that immediately announced the presence of a major new talent. The Ghost Writer, his eleventh book, begins with a young writer's search, twenty years ago, for the spiritual father who will comprehend and validate his art, and whose support will justify his inevitable flight from a loving but conventionally constricting Jewish middle-class home.  Nathan Zuckerman's quest brings him to E.I. Lonoff, whose work--exquisite parables of desire restrained--Nathan much admires.  Recently discovered by the literary world after decades of obscurity, Lonoff continues to live as a semi-recluse in rural Massachusetts with his wife, Hope, scion of an old New England family, whom the young immigrant married thirty-five years before.  At the Lonoffs' Nathan also meets Amy Bellette, a haunting young woman of indeterminate foreign background.  He is instantly infatuated with the attractive and gifted girl, and at first takes her for the aging writer's daughter.  She turns out to be a former student of Lonoff's--and may also have been Lonoff's mistress.  Zuckerman, with his imaginative curiosity, wonders if she could be the paradigmatic victim of Nazi persecution.  If she were, it might change his life.

A figure of fun to the New York literati, a maddeningly single-minded isolate to his wife, teacher-father-savior to Amy, Lonoff embodies for an enchanted Nathan the ideal of artistic integrity and independence.  Hope sees Amy (as does Amy herself) as Lonoff's last chance to break out of his self-imposed constraints, and she bitterly offers to leave him to the younger woman, a chance that, like one of his own heroes, Lonoff resolutely continues to deny himself.  Nathan, although in a state of youthful exultation over his early successes, is still troubled by the conflict between two kinds of conscience: tribal and family loyalties, on the one hand, and the demands of fiction, as he sees them, on the other.  A startling imaginative leap to the beginnings of a kind of wisdom about the unreckoned consequences of art.

Shocking, comic, and sad by turns, The Ghost Writer is the work of a major novelist in full maturity."

I have read "Zuckerman Unbound" in the meantime.

Philip Roth received the Booker International Prize in 2011 and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1980.

Fforde, Jasper "Lost in a Good Book"

Fforde, Jasper "Lost in a Good Book" (Thursday Next 2) - 2002 

I read "The Eyre Affair" about Charlotte Brontë's novel "Jane Eyre" last year because someone from the book club recommended it to me. I probably would have never picked it up because it looked a bit like fantasy and science fiction and that is not something I am usually interested in.

But Thursday Next works for SpecOps 27, the Literary Deceives (LiteraTecs) in Special Operations, a fictional division of the British government. With the help of special gadgets and skills, she can enter books and move from one to the next, this is called "bookjumping". This time, she spends a lot of time in "Great Expectations" by Charles Dickens but also visits other places, e.g. Osaka via Gravitube. A device I would like to have in real life in order to visit friends on the other side of the world within a couple of hours.

Same as in her first book, there are a lot of funny names and funny occurrences but the funniest of all is when someone describes our life today as a "sideline" and they agree how weird that must be.

A funny, light book that can be read within a couple of hours but stays with you a lot longer. Whether you're into adventure or chick lit, science fiction or real life, this is a book for everyone. Very entertaining.

I wonder, where her next book "The Well of Lost Plots" will take her.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"Thursday Next is back. This time, it's personal.

For Thursday Next, literary detective without equal, life should be good…

Riding high on a wave of celebrity following the safe return of kidnapped Jane Eyre, Thursday ties the knot with the man she loves.

But marital bliss isn’t quite as it should be. It turns out her husband of one month actually drowned thirty-eight years ago, and no one but Thursday has any memory of him at all.

Someone, somewhere is responsible.

Having barely caught her breath after The Eyre Affair Thursday heads back into fiction in search of the truth, discovering that paper politicians, the lost Shakespearian manuscripts, a flurry of near- fatal coincidences and impending Armageddon are all part of a greater plan.

But whose? And why?"

Basti, Abel & van Helsing, Jan "Hitler in Argentina"

Basti, Abel & van Helsing, Jan "Hitler in Argentina" (German: Hitler überlebte in Argentinien) - 2011

A great and interesting book, whether you believe the authors or not. According to their research, Hitler survived the end of the far and fled to Argentina.

There is a lot to learn about World War II and about South America (and the connection between the two, no matter how much you read, there is always more. That is the impression I have. Even though I read a lot of books, both fiction and non-fiction about this topic (look here), there is something new in every book I read about it. This one was probably the most different one from all the others, the authors try to prove the assumption that Hitler survived the war and lived in Argentina for many many years. I remember hearing the rumours when I was a little child, and they have never stopped.

If this subject interests you, try to find a copy. The research is highly interesting.

Even though I found the English title of this book, I have not been able to find it from one of the online booksellers. This is what I found in English in one of the descriptions. You can find more information about the publications here.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

About Abel Basti:

"Basti claims that Hitler has fled to Argentina after world war two.
 
He also was the coordinator of several expeditions near the Argentinean sea coast, with the goal of finding submarines that were used by the German Kriegsmarine."

Clarke, Susanna "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell"

Clarke, Susanna "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell" - 2004

"Two magicians shall appear in England. The first shall fear me; the second shall long to behold me Centuries ago, when magic still existed in England, the greatest magician of them all was the Raven King."

If I said about me that I am not exactly the biggest fan of fantasy, that would be a huge understatement. I used to like fairy tales as a child and am still quite fond of them but that's about it.

When the online "Chunky Book Club" put this title on their list, I wasn't too sure whether I shouldn't even skip this one. But, my son already had it on his shelf (he loves fantasy) and therefore I thought, what harm can it do, I can always put it aside. But - even though I wouldn't declare it my most favourite book of the year - I carried on reading it, all 1,024 pages of it.

It is a lot more a Grimm's fairy tale with a little bit of Victoriana mixed in than a JRR Tolkien kind of fantasy novel. It is also more an alternate history book with a lot of links to non-existing literature. It almost feels like a Dickens novel. Quite entertaining, actually.

Two magicians want to bring back magic to England. We meet historical figures like the Duke of Wellington or Lord Byron as well as some illustrious fictional inhabitants of fairieland. We can read a lot of quotes from the books about Magic that have presumably been written by either of the two protagonists or other magician characters from the book. I would have wished them to be printed at least as large as the rest as there are a lot of quotes, sometimes they contain whole stories by itself.

As in so many fantasy books, the main theme is the fight between good and evil, who will win the big battle?

In any case, as a fan of England, I was not disappointed with the book, even though this is not my favourite genre and never will be. But Susanna Clarke has an interesting writing style, I will look into her other writing, as well.

The book received a lot of prizes and nominations, i.a. it was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2004.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"The year is 1806. England is beleaguered by the long war with Napoleon, and centuries have passed since practical magicians faded into the nation's past. But scholars of this glorious history discover that one remains: the reclusive Mr. Norrell whose displays of magic send a thrill through the country. Proceeding to London, he raises a beautiful woman from the dead and summons an army of ghostly ships to terrify the French. Yet the cautious, fussy Norrell is challenged by the emergence of another magician: the brilliant novice Jonathan Strange. Young, handsome and daring, Strange is the very opposite of Norrell. So begins a dangerous battle between these two great men which overwhelms the one between England and France. And their own obsessions and secret dabblings with the dark arts are going to cause more trouble than they can imagine."

Palma, Félix J. "The Map of Time"

Palma, Félix J. "The Map of Time" (Spanish: El mapa del tiempo) - 2008

I absolutely loved this book. It's the first time I really enjoyed a book about time travel, usually that is not my type of thing. Some reasons might be the time and place this is happening, I absolutely love Victorian and pre-Victorian England, the fact that there is a book background ... or maybe because I had the feeling that the author does not really believe in time travel, either, but had a lot of fun writing this story. I enjoyed going through all the different kinds of explanations there are that time travel could be possible and certainly would enjoy taking all the arguments apart.

There are several different stories in the book. I think the first one was the best, someone who wanted to go back in time in order to save someone's life and somebody else who does everything possible in order to save that person's life again (or rather quite a few others working together). Very sweet.
I did think it was a good way to start the story, it would not have been as exciting, if the author had started with another one of the chapters.

I have not read "The Time Machine" that is more or less the basis for this story, only watched the classic movie. The novel is on my wish list now.

I believe that any dystopian novel (and this is one from the point of view of the protagonists) reflects on the time it has been written, it reveals the angst of the time, if you want. The people of the late 19th century were afraid that technology would take over, and it has, even more than they could ever have imagined. Same as I believe that 1984 has come true today, I believe that the vision described in this book has come true today, even though London still stands. And I'm more than grateful for that, it's my favourite city.

At the end of the day, I do believe time travel is possible and we all do it every day when we pick up our books and let us transfer to places and times we have never seen and probably will never see but we live a new life with every new story.

Now, I hope this is the beginning of a long discussion ...

This is one of the books from the Chunky Book Club. If you are interested in reading big books, you might want to join there. It's a great group.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"An epic, ambitious and page-turning mystery that will appeal to fans of 'The Shadow of the Wind', 'Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell' and 'The Time Traveller’s Wife'

London, 1896. Andrew Harrington is young, wealthy and heartbroken. His lover Marie Kelly was murdered by Jack the Ripper and he longs to turn back the clock and save her.

Meanwhile, Claire Haggerty rails against the position of women in Victorian society. Forever being matched with men her family consider suitable, she yearns for a time when she can be free to love whom she choses.

But hidden in the attic of popular author – and noted scientific speculator – H.G. Wells is a machine that will change everything.

As their quests converge, it becomes clear that time is the problem – to escape it, to change it, might offer them the hope they need…"

I have read the sequel in the meantime, "The Map of the Sky". Also a great novel.

Jonasson, Jonas "The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared"

Jonasson, Jonas "The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared" (Swedish: Hundraåringen som klev ut genom fönstret och försvann) - 2009

Translated into 35 languages, the biggest success, except for his native Sweden, was in Germany where he sold over a million copies. And that's where I found this gem of a book. This story contains everything, crime, murder mystery, historical fiction, alternate fiction, love, drama, and a huge sense of humour. It is so hilarious, and exciting. The story is told in two parts, the life of Allan Karlsson until he turns 100 and after he turns 100. And both parts are full of adventures.

This is an easy read novel that is still full of information and philosophy. A nice story about a man who does not want to fit in, who does not want to give up.

On Jonas Jonasson's website, you can find all the countries he travelled to and the people he met during his life. He travelled from Sweden to Moscow, Stalingrad (Volgograd), Gulag camps, Vladivostok, Los Alamos, The White House, Washington, China, Himalaya, Tibet, Afghanistan, Iran, North Korea, Bali, Paris and met Tsar Nicolas (well, that was his father), Gustav Fabergé (his father, as well), Vladimir Lenin, Miguel Primo de Rivera, Francisco Franco, Robert Oppenheimer, Harry S Truman, Soong May-ling, Eleonor Roosevelt, Jiang Ping, Winston Churchill, Tage Erlander, Joseph Stalin, Kim II Sung, Kim Jong II, Kirill Meretskov, Mao Tse Tung, Charles de Gaulle, Lyndon B. Johnson, Richard Nixon.

Apparently, the author is presently writing his second novel. I know exactly who is going to read it once it's out.

From the back cover:

"It all starts on the one-hundredth birthday of Allan Karlsson. Sitting quietly in his room in an old people's home, he is waiting for the party he-never-wanted-anyway to begin. The mayor is going to be there. The press is going to be there. But, as it turns out, Allan is not...Slowly but surely Allan climbs out of his bedroom window, into the flowerbed (in his slippers) and makes his getaway. And so begins his picaresque and unlikely journey involving criminals, several murders, a suitcase full of cash, and incompetent police. As his escapades unfold, we learn something of Allan's earlier life in which - remarkably - he helped to make the atom bomb, became friends with American presidents, Russian tyrants, and Chinese leaders, and was a participant behind the scenes in many key events of the twentieth century. The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out of the Window and Disappeared is a fun, feel-good book for all ages."

Fforde, Jasper "The Eyre Affair"

Fforde, Jasper "The Eyre Affair" (Thursday Next 1) - 2001

I discovered this book because one of our book club members recommended it as a companion to our book club read "Jane Eyre". What a fantastic suggestion.

It is so difficult to put a label on this, it's' a detective story, a thriller, classic reading, alternate history, science fiction, fantasy, mystery, philosophy, religion, a love for word play, weird names, language (he even mentions Esperanto), satire, even a little romance mixed in, you name it, it's in here.

I loved his love for language, his word play. The funniest names appear. Not only is our heroine called Thursday Next, her boss is called Braxton Hicks, she works with Bowden Cable and Victor Analogy, then there is Paige Turner, and we don't want to forget the evil guys Jack Schitt as well as Acheron Hades and his brother Styx (I've been wondering what their father's name would be). With the help of a sort of "time machine", the heroine ventures into a classic novel and helps rewrite the end.

Hilarious! The Rocky Horror Picture Show makes its appearance as a Richard III play, there is a Global Standard Deity religion, various fans of classic authors carry out their feuds, one funny idea chases the other.

The advantage of alternate history - you don't have to be accurate. The disadvantage of science fiction - you have to be consequent. Jasper Fforde manages to combine the two and make the most interesting plot out of this. I especially enjoyed the many allusions to classic literature. Surreal.

I would definitely suggest to read "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë before this book. Not only is this one certainly more interesting if you've read the original but it also contains a lot of spoilers, you really don't want to know the end of the novel before you embark on it.

Still, I loved the book and will explore Thursday's' adventures further in "Lost in a Good Book", "The Well of Lost Plots", "Something Rotten", "First Among Sequels", "One of our Thursdays is Missing" and "The Woman Who Died a Lot".

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"There is another 1985, somewhere in the could-have-been, where the Crimean war still rages, dodos are regenerated in home-cloning kits and everyone is deeply disappointed by the ending of 'Jane Eyre'. In this world there are no jet-liners or computers, but there are policemen who can travel across time, a Welsh republic, a great interest in all things literary - and a woman called Thursday Next. 

In this utterly original and wonderfully funny first novel, Fforde has created a fiesty, loveable heroine and a plot of such richness and ingenuity that it will take your breath away."

Faber, Michel "The Fire Gospel"

Faber, Michel "The Fire Gospel" - 2008

This is considered a fantasy book though I would probably describe it as alternative historical fiction.

Anyway, a scientist visits a museum in Iraq that was looted. He discovers the "fifth gospel" and finds that it is difficult to share with the modern world.

I thought this was an easy read - easy doesn't necessarily say without any background. I loved the story and the writing. This was my first book by the author and it certainly will not be the last.

I didn't think about religion in this book. I mean, anyone can come up with something ancient that was found just recently and thereby try to go back in time. There are enough "fifth gospels" already and we can discuss about whether the ones that did make it into the bible should have been the ones or not. But that is not the point in this book.

I enjoyed reading it. And the amazon reviews were hilarious.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"Theo Griepenkerl is a modest academic with an Olympian ego. When he visits a looted museum in Iraq, looking for treasures he can ship back to Canada, he finds nine papyrus scrolls that have lain hidden for two thousand years. Once translated from Aramaic, these prove to be a fifth Gospel, written by an eye-witness of Jesus Christ's last days. But when Theo decides to share this sensational discovery with the world, he fails to imagine the impact the new Gospel will have on Christians, Arabs, homicidal maniacs and Amazon customers. Like Prometheus's gift of fire, it has incendiary consequences.

The Fire Gospel is an enthralling novel about the power of words to resonate across centuries, and inspire and disrupt in equal measure. Wickedly provocative, hilarious and shocking by turns, it is a revelatory piece of storytelling. "

Chabon, Michael "The Yiddish Policemen's Union"

Chabon, Michael "The Yiddish Policemen's Union" - 2007

This book had been suggested for our book club but hadn't been chosen. As I had enjoyed "Summerland" and like alternative history novels, I tried this one, as well. It was graded as a detective story as well as science fiction. Science fiction is even less my kind of read and I'm also not very keen on detective stories but this novel just sounded very interesting. Instead of settling in Israel, Jewish refugees are sent to Alaska after World War II, especially after the State Israel was destroyed (remember: "alternative history"). They move to Sitka which becomes a Yiddish-speaking town.

We have quite an interesting detective story here with many riddles, it's the story of a loser who tries to achieve something and always fails, as well as the saga of an unsettled people trying to find a home. Despite the negative background and the glum outlook on the future, the book is spiced with a lot of good humour.

Interesting novel, good writing.

Apparently, the Coen Brothers want to use the material for a film, should be interesting.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2023.

From the back cover:

"For sixty years, Jews have prospered in the Federal District of Sitka, a "temporary" safe haven created in the wake of revelations of the Holocaust and the shocking 1948 collapse of the fledgling state of Israel. Now the District is set to revert to Alaskan control, and their dream is coming to an end: once again the tides of history threaten to sweep them up and carry them off into the unknown.

For sixty years, Jewish refugees and their descendants have prospered in the Federal District of Sitka, a "temporary" safe haven created in the wake of revelations of the Holocaust and the shocking 1948 collapse of the fledgling state of Israel. Proud, grateful, and longing to be American, the Jews of the Sitka District have created their own little world in the Alaskan panhandle, a vibrant, gritty, soulful, and complex frontier city that moves to the music of Yiddish. For sixty years they have been left alone, neglected and half-forgotten in a backwater of history. Now the District is set to revert to Alaskan control, and their dream is coming to an end: once again the tides of history threaten to sweep them up and carry them off into the unknown.

But homicide detective Meyer Landsman of the District Police has enough problems without worrying about the upcoming Reversion. His life is a shambles, his marriage a wreck, his career a disaster. He and his half-Tlingit partner, Berko Shemets, can't catch a break in any of their outstanding cases. Landsman's new supervisor is the love of his life - and also his worst nightmare. And in the cheap hotel where he has washed up, someone has just committed a murder - right under Landsman's nose. Out of habit, obligation, and a mysterious sense that it somehow offers him a shot at redeeming himself, Landsman begins to investigate the killing of his neighbor, a former chess prodigy. But when word comes down from on high that the case is to be dropped immediately, Landsman soon finds himself contending with all the powerful forces of faith, obsession, hopefulness, evil, and salvation that are his heritage - and with the unfinished business of his marriage to Bina Gelbfish, the one person who understands his darkest fears.

At once a gripping whodunit, a love story, an homage to 1940s noir, and an exploration of the mysteries of exile and redemption, The Yiddish Policemen's Union is a novel only Michael Chabon could have written."

Stroyar, J.N. "The Children's War" and "A Change of Regime"

Stroyar, J.N. "The Children’s War" - 2001

Stroyar, J.N. "A Change of Regime" - 2004

When people say that Germany lost WWII, I always answer, the Germans didn’t lose the war, the Nazis did. Have you ever wondered what would have happened if the Nazis had won? Well, J. N. Stroyar gives us a pretty good idea. Little is known about the author. She is an American scientist who lives in Germany and has done extensive research on dictatorships around the world.

In her two books "A Children’s War" and "A Change of Regime" she draws a picture that couldn’t be more vivid if it was reality. She describes Europe (and the rest of the world) how it would be today if the war had ended differently. In her scenario, the Nazis won and are still reigning most of Europe. In her history, Hitler’s astrologer convinced him that attacking the Soviet Union was a bad idea, and the German nuclear weapons program saw better progress.

I can honestly say that this is one of the best books I have ever read. The story is completely intriguing, the characters are described in the best possible way, they really are characters, every single one of them, even the description of the landscape that usually is just added to the story is so interesting, you want to devour every single word. There are some very powerful scenes where you think you are part of this book, you can hardly put it down.

You won’t forget this story very fast, I’ve read it six years ago and I still think about it daily. The only bad part is that there isn’t a third book, actually!

From the back covers:

THE CHILDREN'S WAR

"'Peter has had more identities than he can remember and suffered pains and humiliations he longs to forget. But, whether spy or prisoner, slave or propaganda tool, none of his roles has brought the one thing he wants above all: freedom.'

Bad papers. That's how Peter's nightmare began. Living in contemporary Europe under Nazi domination -- more than fifty years after the truce among the North American Union, the Third Reich, and the Soviet Union -- Peter has struggled to make sense of the reign of terror that governs his world. Now, arrested for bearing a false identity, he is pulled full-force into a battle against Nazi oppression. The crusade for freedom that belonged to generations past is now Peter's legacy -- and his future depends not on running away, but on fighting back.

Escaping a Nazi prison camp and joining the Underground Home Army, Peter dedicates himself to breaking down the system that betrayed him. But by facing the evil at the heart of the Nazi political machine, Peter falls deeper into a web of intrigue and adventure that risks everything he holds dear -- in this life and for the sake of future generations.

A disturbingly real vision of what could have been, 'The Children's War' is a page-turning epic thriller with a mesmerizing premise and an unforgettable cast of characters. J.N. Stroyar's searingly authentic, impassioned vision of human triumph over the forces of corruption and cruelty stands as a powerful tribute to the millions who have sacrificed and died in the name of freedom."

A CHANGE OF REGIME

"The struggle against evil continues in 'A Change of Regime', with the characters introduced in J. N. Stroyar's award-winning, critically-acclaimed novel 'The Children's War'. The Third Reich lives on! Having carried out the assassination of his former tormentor Peter Halifax returns to the secret enclave of the anti-Nazi resistance to continue the fight against the regime with his wife Zosia. Emboldened by his success in overcoming his past, Peter returns to Berlin and dices with death to fulfill his dream: providing an escape route for the slave laborers of the Reich. Meanwhile Zosia's brother Ryszard continues his attack from within as he infiltrates, as S. S. Colonel Richard Traugutt, ever deeper into the core of Nazi power, even to within grasp of the ultimate prize: Fhrer of the Third Reich. But there are other forces at work and as Ryszard is forced into betraying Peter, his political enemies plot their own Armageddon. Based on meticulous research and real-life stories, painstaking attention to detail gives the story a brutal reality. The novel addresses the issues of today as the characters wrestle with mad dictators, terrorism, and their own desperate passions. A tale of espionage, of love and betrayal, of courage and collaboration." 

 

13 years after this, the author published a third book from this series:
"Becoming Them" - 2017

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2021.