The Undertaking - Hardcover

Audrey Magee

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1782391029 ISBN 13: 9781782391029

Publisher: Atlantic Books, 2014

Synopsis

Desperate to escape the Eastern front, Peter Faber, an ordinary German soldier, marries Katharina Spinell, a woman he has never met; it is a marriage of convenience that promises 'honeymoon' leave for him and a pension for her should he die on the front. With ten days' leave secured, Peter visits his new wife in Berlin; both are surprised by the attraction that develops between them.

When Peter returns to the horror of the front, it is only the dream of Katharina that sustains him as he approaches Stalingrad. Back in Berlin, Katharina, goaded on by her desperate and delusional parents, ruthlessly works her way into the Nazi party hierarchy, wedding herself, her young husband and their unborn child to the regime. But when the tide of war turns and Berlin falls, Peter and Katharina, ordinary people stained with their small share of an extraordinary guilt, find their simple dream of family increasingly hard to hold on to...

About this title

About the Author

Audrey Magee worked for twelve years as a journalist and has written for, among others, The Times, The Irish Times and the Guardian. She has a Masters degree in journalism from Dublin City University and an honours Bachelor of Arts degree in German and French from University College Dublin. She lives in Wicklow with her husband and three daughters. The Undertaking is her first novel.

Review

A bold and unsettling feat of empathy, all the more daring for its taut, beautifully understated style -- A.D. Miller The Undertaking is written with sympathy and skill. The narrative is tense and engaging, filled with complex undertones, impelled by an urgency and a deep involvement with the characters. -- Colm Toibin A violent, elegant, unsentimental journey through hell and halfway back. This is an outstanding novel by a writer of huge talent and unusual candour. -- Chris Cleave A novel made all the more harrowing by its extreme readability * Observer * An engaging and beautifully written novel, with an emotional resonance that remains long after you've closed the book. It succeeds in doing what only the best historical novels can do - making the past feel present * Independent * 'Brutal but brilliant... Full of heart-pounding suspense... Magee offers an insight both into the deprivation experienced by ordinary soldiers and the excesses of those in power... An impressive, even stunning debut' * Sunday Times (Ireland) * Sweeping, powerful, epic * The Times *

Edition details

• Publisher: Atlantic Books
• Publication date: 2014
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1782391029
• ISBN 13: 9781782391029
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 291