by finn ballard | Mar 14, 2019 | Blog
Although it’s no longer January, and (as you know) certainly no longer freezing, I heartily recommend ‘One Clear Ice-Cold January Morning at the Beginning of the Twenty-First Century’, the debut novel by German playwright Roland Schimmelpfennig. A...
by finn ballard | Nov 29, 2018 | Blog
If you’ve taken a Cold War tour with me, you’ll already have heard this recommendation, but it’s worth repeating that Anna Funder’s ‘Stasiland’ is a must-read for anyone who wants to understand the complex and recent...
by finn ballard | Nov 1, 2018 | Blog
This month’s book is the lengthy but utterly gripping “Travellers in the Third Reich” (2017) by Julia Boyd, a chronicle of experiences of visitors (including Charlie Chaplin and Lloyd George) to Nazi Germany. This marvellous read speaks for itself...
by finn ballard | Oct 4, 2018 | Blog
A break from Nazis and Stasi for this month, to recommend you a book which I devoured in two sittings during my recent trip to Belgrade: John Waller’s ‘A Time to Dance, a Time to Die: The Extraordinary Story of the Dancing Plague of 1518’. During the...
by finn ballard | Sep 6, 2018 | Blog
Several of you recommended this title to me in the last few months, so I am especially pleased to suggest our book of the month for June as Philippe Sand’s ‘East West Street’ (2017). A mixture of family memoir with a compelling legal history, the...
