This is the first book by Vicki Baum which I’ve read although I’ve known about her for years. Hotel Berlin, which is sometimes called Hotel Berlin ’43 was published in 1944.

The setting is obviously Berlin and Berlin Hotel is home to General Arnim von Dahnwitz a war hero and career soldier of the old school who has attracted the wrath of his Fuhrer. The general’s lady friend is a beautiful and famous Berlin stage actress called Lisa Dorn. She has had an easy war as her fame means that the shortages and discomforts of war haven’t touched her. She’s so wrapped up in her life and career that she is completely clueless as to what’s going on around her. Slogans are being chalked up all over the city: “You can kill Richter – but you can’t kill his spirit!”

Gestapo men are all over the hotel, hiding behind newspapers and spying on everyone. The hotel has been searched from top to bottom, in fact the whole of Berlin is being searched for Martin Richter who is a young student who was about to be executed along with other student political activists. They had printed some anti-Nazi pamphlets and had been sentenced to death by beheading, Martin has managed to throw himself off the lorry which he was being transported in and has so far evaded recapture.

This is a tense read, in fact I thought it would have made a great wartime film and really expected to discover that it had been made into one, but apparently not.

According to the storyline things were beginning to fall apart in Berlin as early as 1943 and Hitler was already getting rid of his army generals, blaming them for failures in the war’s progress. If so then the following two years must have been nightmarish.