Help protect children from gaming harms.

Take our survey

Please or to access all these features

What we're reading

Find your new favourite book or recommend one on our Book forum.

Fiction set in pre 1989 Berlin?

65 replies

EnglishGirlApproximately · 25/05/2026 21:11

Currently enjoying a city break in Berlin and finding the reminders of life divided by the wall endlessly fascinating. Can anyone recommend a novel.set during this time? Ideally based on normal people, every day life - nothing too schmaltzy but not too serious either. Happy for it to be a thriller or at a push a romance as long as it's well written. Thanks!

OP posts:
CatsLikeBoxes · 26/05/2026 01:59

Confession with blue horses by Sophie hardach is a book of before and after 1989 - the main character visits Berlin and is trying to unravel what happened when she was a young child when her family tried to defect

JingsMahBucket · 26/05/2026 02:50

What a great thread @EnglishGirlApproximately. Thanks for starting it.

OvernightBloats · 26/05/2026 02:59

Another vote for Stasiland - a really memorable read.

Spartak · 26/05/2026 04:23

I enjoyed the David Young series of novels which were set in cold war East Germany.

Dontlletmedownbruce · 26/05/2026 04:37

RomainingCalm · 25/05/2026 23:28

I read it a long time ago but ‘The Moment’ by Douglas Kennedy might be worth a look.

Yes I was coming on to recommend this. It's a great read. Berlin serves as a backdrop and it's more about the characters than political. I thought it gave great insight into what life was like in the 80s, it's mostly set in the West. Until I read it I never thought of how restricted life was in the west too, this tiny island within East Germany. People may have been at liberty to leave but most couldn't afford it.

EnglishGirlApproximately · 26/05/2026 06:47

Gosh thanks all, some brilliant recommendations to keep me busy. Berlin is getting under my skin a little bit and we're already planning a return visit.

OP posts:
Halfhardy · 26/05/2026 07:08

The Silence Inbetween by Josie Ferguson. The same family and two threads, the aftermath of World War 2, when the Russians entered the city and 1961 when the Berlin Wall was erected.
A Woman in Berlin mentioned up thread is listed as source material as is the BBC podcast Tunnel 29, which is worth a listen.

FruAashild · 26/05/2026 08:39

Another vote here for The Short End of the Sonnenallee by Thomas Brussig. Set in the early 80s in East Berlin.

Further back if you want to read some books set in prewar Nazi Germany then read Irmgard Keun. Her books are short but capture 1930s Germany so vividly. The Artificial Silk Girl is partly set in Berlin but After Midnight or A Child of All Nations are probably her best novels.

Bit different but the graphic novel Madgermanes by Birgit Weyhe about Mozambican workers in East Germany who went there in the 1970s.

Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck. Another East Berlin novel about an age gap relationship.

Reader19 · 26/05/2026 09:14

EnglishGirlApproximately · 25/05/2026 21:22

As far as I can remember I haven't read anything set in Berlin so I'll check them both out thanks. Is The Wall Jumper based on the story of the soldier who jumped the wall in the famous image?

Not as far as I'm aware. It has a number of characters who jump the Wall, for different reasons. I'm not very helpful here as I haven't read it yet, but here are some more helpful links!

Here's the blurb: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/57480/the-wall-jumper-by-schneider-peter/9780141187983

Here's a piece by Ian McEwan on the book: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/oct/22/featuresreviews.guardianreview31

This thread has reminded me that I'd really like to read it. And it is a short novel.

Guineapigs4ever · 26/05/2026 09:40

The House by the Lake by Thomas Harding is fascinating/riveting

Fiction set in pre 1989 Berlin?
Papyrophile · 26/05/2026 13:57

No one has mentioned Philip Kerr's 'Bernie Gunter' series of crime novels yet. The earliest are the best. Quite dark but very readable, and interesting on the early years of National Socialism.

Ohwhatfuckeryitistoride · 26/05/2026 15:32

Berlin Noir series by Philip Kerr. Ex policeman turned detective in 30s Berlin through the war and after.

Ohwhatfuckeryitistoride · 26/05/2026 15:33

Papyrophile · 26/05/2026 13:57

No one has mentioned Philip Kerr's 'Bernie Gunter' series of crime novels yet. The earliest are the best. Quite dark but very readable, and interesting on the early years of National Socialism.

Sorry- x posted.

Papyrophile · 26/05/2026 15:34

The fanclub spotted this simultaneously.... love it!

38thparallel · 26/05/2026 15:48

I second recommendations for films Lives of Others and Barbara.
There is another excellent one called The Legend of Rita which is about a revolutionary group like Baader Meinhof in Paris. A cop is killed and they are given sanctuary in East Germany.

Penelopeandherpitstop · 26/05/2026 17:20

Also second the film The Lives of Others.

For books, there is Ian McEwan's The Innocent, which is set in 1950s postwar and early Cold War Berlin.

EnglishGirlApproximately · 26/05/2026 19:14

Brilliant thanks everyone, I think I've read the Douglas Kennedy but all other suggestions are new to me. I've been in a bit of a reading slump lately finding most books disappointing so hopefully these will help

OP posts:
CrossPurposes · 26/05/2026 23:29

crackofdoom · 26/05/2026 00:14

I looked for it last year and couldn't find it on a single streaming service:(

Good Bye Lenin! is streaming on Prime at the moment.

Teatotally · 27/05/2026 18:56

My husband is a Berlin wall obsessive and also recommends "They Divided the Sky" by Christa Wolf. Also got some good tips from here for presents!!

TeaAndStrumpets · 27/05/2026 19:06

The latest Mick Herron book is mostly set in 1994 Berlin. The Secret Hours I think. It is connected to the Slough House series but can be read as a standalone. Really gripping.

Edit sorry a bit later than you asked for but very atmospheric.

Gardeningsideeffects · 28/05/2026 01:25

1dayatatime · 26/05/2026 00:03

For a TV series I would really recommend Deutschland 83 and 86.

And 89!

elkiedee · 04/06/2026 01:40

Brigitte Reimann, Siblings is good but it's set in 1961. If you're looking for something closer to 1989, perhaps Jenny Erpenbeck's Kairos

MsAmerica · 04/06/2026 05:05

I was reading some book reviews, ran across this, and remembered seeing your post here.

See if this is up your alley.

BERLIN SHUFFLE
Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz

https://pushkinpress.com/book/berlin-shuffle/

And if you want non-fiction, try A Woman in Berlin, a startling post-WW2 memoir which was only published much after the fact.

elkiedee · 04/06/2026 05:16

Ohwhatfuckeryitistoride · 26/05/2026 15:33

Sorry- x posted.

I like the Bernie Gunther novels too, although they are set between the 1930s - the Nazi era, wartime and after, and Bernie gets involved in early Nazi hunting days. He's a cynical PI, and Philip Kerr obviously had a lot of fun pastiching Marlow. If you don't find Marlow pastiche funny it could be grating. There are 14 books in the series and if you use Kindle you can probably get bargains, more easily. Books 1-3 in the series are most easily available as a trilogy, in paperback or Kindle.

---------

Sadly Philip Kerr died in his early 60s a few years ago, but Jane Thynne obviously shared her husband's interest, and has written a number of books of her own, including 3 series of books

The first is the Clara Thynne books, featuring a young woman who is half German, half English, was brought up in England and has now come to Berlin.

The second features a woman in London being recruited as some kind of agent, and returning to places she knew before like Vienna and Paris.

Then there are two books set in alternate reality British Reich, written under another name - C J Carey I think - #1 is Widowland

And a recent standalone set in the 30s. She has also written a handful of other books before she joined Kerr in writing about this stuff. I wonder if they fought over reference books!