Empty Hearts

June 17, 2019
In this intriguing near-future dystopian thriller from Zeh (Compression), Germany, now ruled by populists, has implemented massive budget cuts; France has left the EU; and there’s a global financial crisis. Britta Söldner has come up with an innovative algorithm to capitalize on the increased depression these events have caused: Lassie, which uses data mining to search the internet for people considering suicide. She invites those identified as candidates to her business, the Bridge, which ostensibly provides “healing therapy for suicide prevention.” Most are dissuaded from self-harm, and Britta links the others with organizations looking to deploy them in suicide missions for a fee paid to the Bridge and the participants’ survivors. After a failed terror attack on an airport, carried out by would-be suicide bombers who weren’t identified by the never-wrong Lassie, Britta fears a rival entity might be responsible. Britta’s search for an explanation will keep readers turning the pages. Not every detail rings true, but Zeh makes it easy to suspend disbelief in this cold-blooded and macabre future.

June 15, 2019
In the near future, a German woman finds a way to make money from terrorism, but a rival may be gunning for her business in this darkly entertaining work. It's some eight years since Angela Merkel resigned, and Germany's government is controlled by the Concerned Citizens' Crusade, a conservative group that is "dismantling one hard-won democratic achievement after the other." But in liberal circles like Britta's, there is only dinner-party protest and numbed acceptance. "It's been years since anyone has known what to think," Britta thinks in one of the novel's many cool Didion-esque apercus. Equally cool is the matter-of-fact reveal that Britta and her gay Iraqi partner, Babak, run an agency out of Braunschweig that provides candidates for any sort of suicide bombing required by activists/terrorists from Greenpeace to the Islamic State group. With their careful screening and preparation, they limit collateral damage, body counts, and the likelihood of cold feet. And they dominate the business. So Britta is surprised when two unknown men wearing suicide belts are caught at the Leipzig airport. An attempted bombing in their backyard could be an unknown competitor. German novelist Zeh (Decompression, 2014, etc.), recipient of various European awards for her fiction, tells the story with partial omniscience through Britta and develops a fine character study while exploring the challenges and ironies of being a wife and mother while waterboarding at the office (part of the screening process). The intrigue deepens as Britta realizes that the man with the bad mustache who is bankrolling her husband's app is also the driver of the white Toyota Hilux she's been seeing too often. Spooks, codes, kidnapping, plot, and counterplot--it gets complicated but remains strangely low on violence given the grim premise. A thoughtful political thriller with a provocative sense of humor.

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June 1, 2019
In near-future Braunschweig, Germany, the recently elected, far-right CCC Party passes Efficiency Measures to erode constitutional provisions. Amid palpable political tension, Britta and her business partner, Babak, are forced to confront their beliefs about the greater good when their therapeutic program for suicidal clients, called the Bridge, attracts a dangerous competitor. The Bridge's clients are put through Britta's rigorous 12-step program, designed to either cure them of their suicidal urges or link them with a terrorist group for use in suicide attacks, but attacks that, by contract, impose limits on casualties. Britta and Babak share the misguided conviction that controlling the scope of terrorist attacks in this way provides significant public benefit. It's gone according to plan until an unexpected suicide bombing in Leipzig announces a threat to the order they've imposed. When a start-up company run by Britta's husband, Richard, snags a new investor, Britta realizes that her new enemy has brought the battle to her. A gripping, character-driven thriller that's rooted in insightful political commentary?perfect for beach reading and book groups.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)

March 1, 2019

In a near-future of armed conflict and ultrapopulist movements, German businesswoman Britta runs a suicide prevention clinic--and an organization that secretly supplies terrorists with suicide bombers. She's tops in the business until her database is stolen. From the winner of multiple awards (e.g., the Thomas Mann Prize).

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.