simplyb 's review for:

Leaving Berlin by Joseph Kanon

3.0

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As somebody who has been to Berlin many times, both pre- but mostly post-"Wende", the scenery of the dilapidated topography of post-war Berlin was what was most striking. As well as the chaos, the uncertainty, the paranoia, and the madness of several governmental and philosophical ideas warring with each other. This is all well-captured in this book, weaved into the architecture of the fallen and the rebuilding. The story's main characters mainly captured this, but it was hard for me to see the main character Meier as ever being in as full of danger as was made out, which took away from the suspense it was trying to build. The double-crossings and betrayals were well played out with a pretty neat wrap-up in the last 50 pages, although even that had an edge of hurry and convenience to it in an otherwise beautifully painted landscape. So while I loved reading about Berlin and the tumult after the war, and the language/writing itself was very good, I rated it lower than I otherwise would have simply because I just never quite got taken in with the suspense and intrigue. A fun and quick read, but ultimately not quite as edge-of-the seat for the genre.