I usually buy books secondhand if I can and this one is no exception. I have set a limit of 2€ /£2 This one was only £1.29 from Help the Aged in Ashbourne, Derbyshire.

Travel Books of the Year, Sunday Times
‘A journey into the bizarre, scary, secret history of the former East Germany that is both relevant and riveting’


Evening Standard
‘Brilliantly illustrates the weird, horrifying, viciously cruel place that was Cold War East Germany...'

Synopsis
In 1989, the Berlin Wall fell; shortly afterwards the two Germanies reunited, and East Germany ceased to exist. In a country where the headquarters of the secret police can become a museum literally overnight, and one in 50 East Germans were informing on their countrymen and women, there are a thousand stories just waiting to get out. Anna Funder tells extraordinary tales from the underbelly of the former East Germany - she meets Miriam, who as a 16-year-old might have started World War III, visits the man who painted the line which became the Berlin Wall and gets drunk with the legendary "Mik Jegger" of the East, once declared by the authorities to his face to "no longer to exist".

Time to move this up the pile of TBR and to beside my bed in the hope it'll get read!

You'll find this book somewhere at the BC 'little Christmas' party.

It's time to let this book go. Hope it finds a new reader and a new temporary home before being re-released again.

I love reading where books end up -and what other readers thought of the book (good and bad!) - so do please take time to make a journal entry if you possibly can. Appreciate that!

WWII related history is something that interests me, and I also believe in understanding people and the world through their history. Cold war times is a very faint hue in my own memory, but I can vividly remember the news flashes on the fall of Berlin Wall. Its history is terrifying, but the people who've lived in its domain are amazing and the history of Stasi espionage mindboggling. Just have to read the book to know more.

Once started, I couldn't read the book fast enough and now I'm left craving for more. History never ceases to amaze me with all its brutality and hidden truths - though you can only guess what the truth was in all these stories alone. Hence, this was more like a series of biographies to me than absolute truths - it's not the words but the feelings they conveyed. But still, Anna Funder's journey in the recent history is more intriguing than Alice's to the Wonderland. The whole schizophrenic, weirder-than-fiction world of East Berlin and Stasi regime (well could you call it any other way?) is more than brought to life on the pages of the book. I bet the people who's lives you get to have a a glimpse into will stay with you for a while.

Found on Savotar's wishlist, so off it goes!

Tämä vapautus osallistuu Appelsiinin 52 viikon vapautushaasteeseen! Tässä siis vapautus viikolle 1, teemana menneen tunteminen uuden paremmin ymmärtämiseksi. Kirja käsittelee uuden, yhdistyneen Saksan ymmärtämistä vanhan kahtiajakautuneen valtion kautta ja juurihan vuosikin vaihtui - uutta täytyisi oppia elämään...

Thank you, Pippis. Sorry for the belated journal entry - again. The book made me happy, I am hoping to travel to Berlin within a few years again.

This is the type of book I normally read very quickly but in this situation where I am now, all reading, except for research-related, is slow. So I have been travelling with the book all spring and now, at Midsummer,I am finally ready with it.

I liked the writer's approach to the topic and I like her style, which combines personal experience with the world history. Also the people she describes are very interesting. Reading about how all interviews do not always work out as well as she hoped, is also very comforting, as in my project I get similar fallbacks as well.

My husband enjoyed this book too, so now it is ready for new readers.

Taking this book along to the bc-meeting. Happy reading!

My wishlist book appeared at the meet-up so of course I had to grab it & take it home! I'm interested in everything Berlin-related so I suppose this won't stay in my TBR-pile for too long.

I was going to say about the same as Savotar before me - that I liked the writer's style and the personal touches she added to it, and that pretty much everyone she included in the book had a really interesting story to tell. Also, I thought I've already heard everything Stasi has possibly done but this book still had a couple of surprises left for me!

Let's see if the book finds yet another reader here in Turku... taking it to the next meet-up.

I took the book, it seems interesting!

The book was very interesting and also haunting to read. You just can't imagine what it must have been like in DDR, and I think this book will be haunting my thoughts for a long time. I kept comparing these stories with Orwell's 1984, which I read in winter. Some of the things were excactly the same!

I have two DDR related memories: my father worked a few weeks in East Berlin in the 80's, but he stayed in a hotel in West Berlin - so he had to cross the Wall twice every day. He said the border procedures were a bit frustrating. Also, I have a vivid memory of our family coming across an East German car at a rest stop somewhere in Finland during our summer holiday. And the car was full of sleeping people... I guess they had no money for lodgings even though they had managed to travel abroad.

The book will be looking new readers at the meet-up.

I took the book from a meet-up as it was praised there.

I read parts of this, but for some reason I just didn't finish the book as interesting as it is.

The book was left at the local bc meet-up.

I took the book from yesterday's recycling meet-up. The subject is interesting but I'm very lazy to get anything read in other languages than Finnish so let's see if I'll read it or pass forward..

Thanks for the book, it was fun at the meet-up!