Fear
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
A masterpiece of psychological suspense for fans of The Dinner and We Need to Talk About Kevin.
Randolph Tiefenthaler insists he had a normal childhood, though he grew up with a father who kept thirty loaded guns in the house. A modestly successful architect with an attractive, intelligent wife, Rebecca, and two children, Randolph finds his life turned upside down when his father, a man he loves yet has always feared, is imprisoned for murder.…
Fear is the story of the twisted events leading up to his father’s incarceration. It begins when Randolph and his family move into a new building and meet their neighbour, Dieter Tiberius, the peculiar yet seemingly friendly man living in the basement apartment. As the Tiefenthalers settle into their home, they become increasingly disturbed as Dieter’s strange behaviour turns malevolent — sending erotic letters to Rebecca, spying, making accusations of child abuse, and filing police reports he against the Tiefenthalers. Finally, Randolph confesses his own feelings of desperation and helplessness, which ultimately lead to his father’s intervention.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
At the start of German author Kurbjuweit's unsettling U.S. debut, Randolph Tiefenthaler visits his unresponsive 77-year-old father, Hermann, in an institution that at first appears to be a care facility, but is in fact a prison. Hermann is serving time for the shooting death of Dieter Tiberius, Randolph's downstairs neighbor in Berlin. Randolph's narration shifts back in forth in time between his "happy" childhood, when he nevertheless feared being shot by his gun-loving father, and the recent past, when he fears what Dieter may do to his family. Dieter, initially solicitous to his new upstairs neighbors, begins leaving sexually suggestive writings addressed to Rebecca, Randolph's wife, and letters suggesting that Randolph and Rebecca are sexually abusing their children. Kurbjuweit generates suspense by making the reader wonder what exactly precipitates Dieter's killing, who is really responsible, and what the reader might do in the Tiefenthalers' place. The question of whether any of us is capable of murder is not new, and while Kurbjuweit's characters are also not unique, we care enough about these flawed people to keep turning the pages.
