The Berlin Girl: A Novel of World War II
Looking back on the horrors of the Holocaust and World War II, we may wonder how that terrible debacle could have come about in such a supposedly civilized society. What were the warning signs? Mandy Robotham’s latest novel explores those questions and provides interesting insight into a society on the brink of disaster, along with the compelling story of a young journalist who quickly loses her objectivity in light of the stark injustices she witnesses.
The year is 1938. After volunteering for an assignment few of her colleagues want, Londoner Georgie Young needs to prove herself to her editor as well as to her handsome but disapproving fellow journalist, Max Spender. The camaraderie of the foreign press acts as a counterbalance to the growing list of horrors she encounters, including Krystallnacht. Against her better judgment, Georgie accepts a date with an SS officer—at first because she’s attracted to him, but later to dig up vital information that may save the lives of her Jewish driver and his family. Interspersed throughout Georgie’s story are chapters relating the terror and courage of her driver—a former journalist himself—and his wife as they try to save a disabled brother and their children from the encroaching Nazi death machine.
One of the strengths of the novel is the sense of authenticity. The Holocaust didn’t happen overnight, and it didn’t occur in a vacuum. Georgie and the other journalists desperately try to warn the rest of the world about the signs they are seeing, but no one on the outside wants to hear it. This is a timely book as authoritarian regimes around the world flex their muscles once again. The Berlin Girl reminds us to pay attention.
