Ghosts of Berlin

August 12, 2019
Everyday problems are complicated by weird plot thickeners in these seven vivid and intriguing stories from the author of A Short History of Nuclear Folly. A filmmaker as well and the son of director Werner Herzog, Herzog writes relatively lengthy stories told in short cuts; the reader has time to inhabit the world of the protagonist before the plot turns dark, often with a strain of deadpan humor. In “Needle and Thread,” Bjorn is so wrapped up in his corporate dealings that he ignores, at his own peril, the pleas of his daughter, Alena, about a figure lurking in her bedroom. In “Key,” the admittedly neurotic violinist Stiebel struggles to adjust to his new apartment and a move to Berlin. He develops a complicated relationship with a prickly neighbor named Wondrak, who triggers inexplicable emotions in him. In “Tandem,” Greek immigrant and language teacher Dmitri finds himself drawn to his sweet German student Lotte, until she commits a shockingly rapacious act. The common thread in the stories is the city of Berlin and the dark shadows in its history. These links unfold in different ways as each story progresses. That this history is rarely addressed directly adds tension and resonance. The macabre mischief in Herzog’s tales is far from benign and speaks eloquently to the anxiety of modern life.

September 15, 2019
The paranormal intrudes upon the lives of Berliners, exposing unresolved tensions about the city's past and ambivalence about its present. A young entrepreneur lands a plum apartment, but becomes the target of a vengeful spirit from when the space was a squatter's pad. Puddles of blood appear on an American expat's floor, a clue to a long-ago tragedy. Apparitions of a hunger-striking seamstress visit the family of a start-up executive too harried to care about overseas working conditions. An adventure-seeking market researcher pursues a demon bent on sabotaging the city's airports. Herzog (A Short History of Nuclear Folly, 2013) is certainly not the first to consider how Berlin is haunted by its history, but his collection's explicit foregrounding of the macabre is a clever sleight of hand that also allows for consideration of gentrification. The war and the wall remain deep reservoirs of horror and grief, but most of Herzog's social commentary is aimed at present-day residents and their moral blind spots, especially where real estate is concerned. Sharp satire, and a worthy addition to the growing canon of Berlin ghost-lit.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)