March Violets

Notes

March Violets by Philip Kerr is the first of his Bernie Gunther novels. What happens when you drop a man with “a mind like a comic book” into the middle of a power-play between Heinrich Himmler and Hermann Goering?

That was Berlin under the National Socialist Government: a big, haunted house with dark corners, gloomy staircases, sinister cellars, locked rooms and a whole attic full of poltergeists on the loose, throwing books, banging doors, breaking glass, shouting in the night and generally scaring the owners so badly that there were times when they were ready to sell up and get out. But most of the time they just stopped up their ears, covered their blackened eyes and tried to pretend that there was nothing wrong. Cowed with fear, they spoke very little, ignoring the carpet moving underneath their feet, and their laughter was the thin, nervous kind that always accompanies the boss’s little joke.

March Violets by Philip Kerr

Nazi Noir, with wisecracks to match.

Publisher’s Synopsis

Brutal ex-convicts or the Nazi elite – in Bernie Gunther’s world it’s hard to tell who are the real gangsters. Hard-boiled noir thriller for fans of Raymond Chandler and John le Carré.

Ex-Berlin cop and private detective Bernie Gunther has seen his share of bad guys. But when the worst guys of all are the ones running the show, it’s much harder to stay out of their reach.

Hired by a wealthy industrialist to investigate the murder of his daughter and her husband in an apparent botched robbery, Bernie soon finds himself drawn into the complex – not to mention lethal – internal politics and corruption of the Nazi party. When Hermann Goering himself calls Bernie in with a task for him that throws his existing case into a whole new light, he must weigh up his hatred of the Nazis against his desire to stay alive.

Bernie Gunther – sly, subversive, sardonic, and occasionally hilarious – is one of the greatest anti-heroes ever written. We’re in good hands here. – Lee Child

Read a full review of March Violets by Philip Kerr at Murder Mayhem And More.