Book Review: A Woman in Berlin by Anonymous

This past week, I read A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in a Conquered City. It was hard to get through, not because of the writing which I loved considering the material, but just with how emotional the book was. The novel is the diary of a woman who recorded daily life during the Russian occupation of Berlin during the second World War.

For years, the book was published without credit, since its author feared what could become of her if it was known that she had in fact written it. It is presumed that the diary actually was of German journalist, Marta Hillers. 

The diary largely chronicles the brutality and atrocities that can and do occur during wartime. The author descriptively records the multiple rapes se suffered at the hands of the Red Army, the murders, the suicides and the bombings that prevailed in Berlin following Hitler's fall from power. She raises the question, is it really the more humane thing to do to leave women and children behind while men fight in wars? Without protection, women do become the booty of war (pun intended) and they die, along with the children. 

The author is admirable because instead of making herself the victim, which she no doubt is, she rises above that. She uses her mind and her body to keep herself safe and to ensure that she can get food to feed herself and in turn the people that she lives with. Her bravery and courageousness that echoes in her writing is just unbelievable as when she was writing this, there was no end in sight for her. This was her life. 

The book moves pretty quickly and what I enjoyed most about it was the author's writing style. Though written in the 1940's, the book had a more modern feel to the way it was written, completely pulling me into her story and the story of those she lived with. 

Score: 4 out of 5
Book Information: A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in a Conquered City is available for purchase with ISBN 0312426119 via Picador. This version was originally published in July 2006.

If you're interested, there was even a movie made of this book not too long ago:

Book Review: I Don't Care About Your Band by Julie Klausner

I read Klausner's book following my breakup from yet another guy claiming musician. I read it solely based on two facts: 1.) my book club had picked it for our April meeting and 2.) because of the slightly long-winded subtitle, "What I Learned From Indie Rockers, Trust Funders, Pornographers, Felons, Faux-Sensitive Hipsters, And Other Guys I've Dated."

I absolutely loved her opening chapter where she compares us to Miss Piggy and these men to Kermit. I found myself laughing to myself as I read. There's is a lot of truth to it. Miss Piggy was awesome and spent a lot of time chasing Kermit, a guy that would never really work to make anything work with her because he was content being with his friends (sans attachment) and working on making his show and it worked as long as Miss Piggy didn't ask for more. But that's the thing when you love someone or even really like someone, eventually you do want more than that. I have spent a large expanse of my dating life going after these guys that have no real sense of obligation, adulthood or anything other then the need they feel to be sitting by the swamp mindlessly strumming their banjo a la Kermit the Frog. 

Klausner really nailed what it is like to be a 20-something trying to navigate the pool of toads in search of the prince. She does it sarcastically and with a great sense of humor as she candidly describes her failed attempts at romance with all sorts of guys that just, well, seemed absolutely clueless. 

What made me want to stop reading her book was when I got to the parts where Klausner seems to have lost her sense of self and overall, her standards for herself. It's one thing to get so wrapped up in someone that you don't really realize how crappy he's treating you until you finally have that moment of clarity, but with a lot of what Klausner writes about, she openly says how there were guys she was with that she didn't even like and often slept with just to prove something. The worst being the guy that used to abuse her that she sleeps with again years later or that one night stand she gets into where she goes home the next morning completely infested with bed bugs. Standards, we need to hold on to those!

Overall, I enjoyed the book despite those sections where I just wanted to grab her and shake her. It was also refreshing to get to the end of the book and not have her end it with a fairy-tale romance of her thirties because that's not how it's always going to happen. Your 30's are not going to be the magical time where it all comes together just like your 20's haven't been either. 

Score: 3 out of 5

Book Information: I Don't Care About Your Band by Julie Klausner is available for purchase on amazon with ISBN 1592405614 from Gotham Publishing. It was reprinted in February 2010.