Rory MacLean has known three Berlins: West Berlin, where he made movies with David Bowie and Marlene Dietrich; East Berlin, where he researched his first book, Stalin's Nose; and the unified capital where he lives today. He is the author of nine books and has won awards from the Canada Council and Arts Council of England as well as a Winston Churchill Traveling Fellowship. He was an International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award nominee and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
"Brilliant." --National Geographic Traveler"Berlin is the most extraordinary work of history I've ever read.... It's a work of imagination, reflection, reverence, perplexity, and criticism that reveals as much about the author's precocious mind as it does about the city he adores.... Stunningly beautiful writing." --The Washington Post"MacLean reveals his prowess as a storyteller, flawlessly weaving together history, facts, and folklore.... [He] brings this 'city of fragments and ghosts, ' with its fractured and volatile past, to life." --Publishers Weekly (starred review)"Sprawling, experimental, and in certain moments, ungainly but also deeply enthralling, much like the city itself." --Booklist (starred review)"A series of imaginative and fanciful narrative segments--a history that is not all gloom and doom. " --Kirkus Reviews"A wonderfully enjoyable, poetic and instructive tour through the history of this fascinating and changing city. A book that magnificently combines real history and pure reading pleasure. Not just for those interested in Germany, but for anyone interested in the history of Western culture." --Stephane Kirkland, author of Paris Reborn"Grandly ambitious . . . splendid. [T]his book is a wonderful achievement, not justly to be summarized in the few hundred words of a review, but hauntingly representing, as in a tangled dream, six hundred years of history." --The Telegraph (UK)"MacLean's wonderfully knowledgable overview of the city's history helps explain the place's enduring fascination." --The Guardian (UK)"Vivid, imaginative . . . brilliant. What makes MacLean's history of Berlin stand out is that this is an intensely human document, a rich tapestry spanning five centuries and woven together through intimate portraits of twenty-one of its former inhabitants that collectively reveal the narrative of the city . . . Their stories are wholly engaging, written with the flair of a novelist." --The Observer (UK)"Entertaining and ambitious . . . MacLean has written a great book about Berliners." --New Statesman (UK)"superb...[MacLean] has a knack of approaching his subjects obliquely, catching them unawares....original and well-researched. MacLean is a highly visual writer, and his dialogue is crisp and believable. [He] deserves to win all the prizes going." --The Tablet (UK)"Inventive, exhaustive, and energetic. Berlin is . . . a human story. MacLean tells it with a wonder, a sadness, and a compassion." --Herald Scotland"[MacLean] writes with the lyricism of Bruce Chatwin and the traveller's eye of Marco Polo. He engages with his readers as if he is talking to an intelligent friend. Read this book if you already know Berlin, or will do one day." --The Oldie (UK)"I loved it. It is such a beautiful way of understanding history, its stories are so vivaciously told, it is so heartfelt, so intelligent, and so talkative a book. So many of the characters do end up talking to each other, and the author is eavesdropping. It paints the past and the present, portrays Berlin as a portrait of someone you love. It is beautiful." --Jay Griffiths, author ofWild, Pip Pip, and Kith
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