A Woman in Berlin

A Woman in Berlin was recommended to me by Susanne at least a year ago. I've only just got around to reading it now in the last couple of weeks. It's a hard subject matter - when the Russians arrived in Berlin at the end of WWII, local women ended up the victims of multiple rapes. The anonymous writer tells us of her life over a few weeks in May and June 1945. What remains with me, though, is not the horror, pain and degradation experienced by the author and her friends and neighbours. It's their resilience, stoicism, will to live, and sense of humour. So, despite the desperate circumstances, I found this book quite uplifting. Recommended.

I believe a movie has been made of this book. I've only seen the photos of it when searching images in Google, but somehow, it looks too glamorous - it's the clothes that give me that impression, a petrol blue coat, a red cardigan, too colourful. I shouldn't judge, but it just shows how much a few visual clues can impact our feeling about something that we know nothing about!