From the bestselling author of Alone in Berlin, his acclaimed novel of a young couple trying to survive life in 1930s Germany'Nothing so confronts a woman with the deathly futility of her existence as darning socks'A young couple fall in love, get married and start a family, like countless young couples before them. But Lämmchen and 'Boy' live in Berlin in 1932, and everything is changing. As they desperately try to make ends meet amid bullying bos...

Hans Fallada's "Every Man Dies Alone" is a poignant exploration of individual resistance in the face of immense totalitarian oppression, set against the backdrop of Nazi Germany. Through a compelling narrative style that combines stark realism and psychological depth, Fallada chronicles the story of Otto and Elise Hampel, a couple who undertake a quiet yet courageous act of defiance by distributing anti-Nazi postcards. The novel's fragmented structure and nuanced character development refl...

"The Drinker" is one of the most powerful and psychologically penetrating novels by Hans Fallada. Written in the first person and drawing upon the author's own experiences with addiction, the novel offers a remarkably honest portrayal of how an ordinary, respectable individual can gradually lose control of his life through alcohol. The story centers on Erwin Sommer, a successful middle-class businessman who initially appears to have a stable and comfortable existence. At the beginning of t...

This never-before-translated masterpiece—by a heroic best-selling writer who saw his life crumble when he wouldn’t join the Nazi Party—is based on a true story.It presents a richly detailed portrait of life in Berlin under the Nazis and tells the sweeping saga of one working-class couple who decides to take a stand when their only son is killed at the front. With nothing but their grief and each other against the awesome power of the Reich, they launch a simple, clandestine resista...

THE ACCLAIMED INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER'One of the most extraordinary and compelling novels written about World War II. Ever' Alan FurstInspired by a true story, Hans Fallada's Alone in Berlin is a gripping wartime thriller following one ordinary man's determination to defy the tyranny of Nazi ruleBerlin, 1940, and the city is filled with fear. At the house on 55 Jablonski Strasse, its various occupants try ...

The return of a “superb” forgotten masterpiece about a young couple living in Weimar Germany during the Nazi’s rise to power (Graham Greene)Written just before the Nazis came to power, this darkly enchanting novel tells the simple story of a young couple trying to eke out a devent life amidst an economic crisis that’s transforming their country into a place of anger and despair. It was an international bestseller upon its release, and made into a Hollywood movie—by...

Otto, an ordinary German living in a shabby apartment block, tries to stay out of trouble under Nazi rule. But when he discovers his only son has been killed fighting at the front he's shocked into an extraordinary act of resistance, and starts to drop anonymous postcards attacking Hitler across the city. If caught, he will be executed.Soon this silent campaign comes to the attention of ambitious Gestapo inspector Escherich, and a murderous game of cat-and-mouse begins. Whoever los...

Available for the first time in English, here is an unforgettable portrayal by a master novelist of the physical and psychological devastation wrought in the homeland by Hitler’s war.Late April, 1945. The war is over, yet Dr Doll, a loner and ‘moderate pessimist’, lives in constant fear. By night, he is haunted by nightmarish images of the bombsite in which he is trapped — he, and the rest of Germany. More than anything, he wishes to vanquish the demon of collectiv...

A powerful 1931 portrayal of a German town on the brink of chaos, from bestselling author Hans Fallada (writer of Alone in Berlin)It is summer, 1929, and in a small German town a storm is brewing. The shabby reporter Tredup leads a precarious existence working for the Pomeranian Chronicle - until he takes some photographs that offer the chance to make a fortune. In Krüger's bar, the farmers are plotting their revenge on greedy officials. A mysterious trave...

'It was what we call in the trade a potato...'Tales of low-lifes and grifters trying to make ends meet in pre-War Germany.Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kathy Acker to James Baldwin, Truman Capote to Stanislaw Lem and George Orwell to Shirley Jackson; essays radical and i...

'...I stare at the coffee I poured myself, and I think: caffeine is a poison that stimulates the heart. There are plenty of instances of people killing themselves with coffee, hundreds and thousands of them. Caffeine is a deadly poison, maybe almost as deadly as morphine. Why didn't it ever occur to me before: coffee is my friend!'Drawing on Hans Fallada's own history of addiction, these two stories and are written with a remarkable, tough, spartan clarity. As a ma...

One of the great German writers of the 20th century draws from his own life to present a “brave, fearless, and honest” tale of one man’s dark descent into depression and alcoholism (The Sunday Times, London)This astonishing, autobiographical tour de force was written by Hans Fallada in an encrypted notebook while he was incarcerated in a Nazi insane asylum. Discovered after his death, it tells the tale—often fierce, often poignant, often extremely funny—of...