This is a book of innocence and deception. Friedrich, an unworldly young Swiss man, with aspirations of being an artist arrives in Berlin in 1942. Soon involved with Kristin, the life model, he's sucked into the dark life of Nazi Berlin. He knows nothing about Kristin, she slips in and out of his life. Then she re-appears, head shaved, bruised, shoulder out socket, and reveals she's a Jew who'd got caught. Her real name is Stella Goldschlag.
Stella is a real character, a blonde haired, blue-eyed Jew, who managed to survive until she was captured and persuaded to hunt out fellow Jews for the Nazis to protect her parents, and though her parents were sent to Auschwitz she continued to be a catcher for the Nazis.
Unfortunately, in this book, I couldn't feel any sympathy for Kristin, and wondered if I was meant to. I knew about 'catchers', and could never understand how anyone could do that. We don't feel Kristin's anguish over her parents strongly enough to have some understanding of why she did what she did. The real Stella was estimated to have caused the capture of up to 2,000 Jews, and the book is interspersed with brief accounts of the capture of Jews.
The book could have been much more hard hitting but it meandered in a way that kept from the brutality of the times though each chapter starts with a paragraph of factual history. Characterization wasn't particularly strong either.
Stella is a real character, a blonde haired, blue-eyed Jew, who managed to survive until she was captured and persuaded to hunt out fellow Jews for the Nazis to protect her parents, and though her parents were sent to Auschwitz she continued to be a catcher for the Nazis.
Unfortunately, in this book, I couldn't feel any sympathy for Kristin, and wondered if I was meant to. I knew about 'catchers', and could never understand how anyone could do that. We don't feel Kristin's anguish over her parents strongly enough to have some understanding of why she did what she did. The real Stella was estimated to have caused the capture of up to 2,000 Jews, and the book is interspersed with brief accounts of the capture of Jews.
The book could have been much more hard hitting but it meandered in a way that kept from the brutality of the times though each chapter starts with a paragraph of factual history. Characterization wasn't particularly strong either.