Return to Berlin

For fans of The Light After the War, a young woman haunted by a heartbreaking secret finds hope and forgiveness in a city shattered by war.

Young Meike Mosbach and her brother escape Berlin just before the horror of Kristallnacht, leaving their parents and little sister to follow them to America. But their family never arrives.

Haunted by their loss, Meike becomes Millie and graduates from college to work as a magazine journalist while David enlists in the army to work in intelligence. After the war, they both return to a shattered Berlin, hoping against hope to find their family.

Postwar Berlin is a wild west where drunken soldiers brawl, spies ply their trade and ‘werewolves’ – unrepentant Nazis – scheme to rise again. Consumed with rage at her former country, Millie’s job for the army rooting out Nazis from regaining a voice seems the perfect outlet. But her anger begins to thaw as she is faced with the daily reality of what the war has done to everyone, and the enigmatic Major Harry Sutton, who seems too eager to be fair to the Germans and far too perceptive about Millie.

In the rubble of postwar Berlin, Millie must come to terms with a devastating secret and find the courage to embrace love – and a new beginning.

Praise for Return to Berlin

‘Feldman has delivered yet another powerful and moving wartime story.’ The Australian

‘A gorgeous, shattering novel that could not be more timely about the dark damage of hatred and the persistence of love.’ Caroline Leavitt, NYT bestselling author of Is This Tomorrow

‘A beautiful, atmospheric novel that transports us to Occupied Berlin, a perfect setting in which to examine the contours of shame, as well as the possibilities of forgiveness.' Elizabeth J. Church, author of The Atomic Weight of Love and All the Beautiful Girls

‘Ellen Feldman masters the two great challenges of the historical novel, mapping the human heart as expertly as she does another time and place. Her story sears, uplifts and compels. A terrific read, brilliantly written.’ Kevin Baker, author of Dreamland and Paradise Alley

‘Postwar Berlin springs vividly to life in this engrossing, emotionally powerful novel … Beautifully written, rich with detail and a brilliantly drawn cast of characters, from a writer with an unrivaled grasp of history and the human heart.' Liza Gyllenhaal, author of Local Knowledge

'A deeply satisfying and truly adult novel.’ Margot Livesey, author of The Flight of Gemma Hardy

‘Exquisite... will stay with readers long after the final page is turned.’ Publishers Weekly

‘This vivid novel should be required reading for those who are wondering why we still to this day find that it is far easier to hate other people than to pause and try to understand them.’ Historical Novels Review

‘Vivid... illuminating... with plenty of action and even some romance, evoking a lesser-known historical period—the immediate postwar era and Berlin before the wall—and the complications and compromises that come with the end of war.’ Book Page