Genocidal maniacs, war criminals and spies

SOMEWHERE along the line, I convinced myself that I didn't like historical fiction. I want to read about the here and now, I thought. It's not true. This week, I read two novels set in the 1930s and 1960s. The world was different and simpler – without cellphones and the internet – and I still knew it to some extent. But people have always been people, and they fascinate me endlessly.

The work I do now, from which I derive much joy, compels me to read all kinds of books that I would once have pushed aside. And it's often a revelation, like these two books.

The first, The Silence In Between, is set in East Berlin, during World War II, when it was still just Berlin. It's hard to believe it's Josie Ferguson's debut. Her voice, characterisation and sense of place are striking. The cold fear, terror, and horrors of war are sketched in the finest detail; sirens blaring, bombs falling, streets full of rubble. Hungry, desperate people betraying each other for a meagre ration. It's hard to believe that now, almost a century later, our world is still being torn apart by war.

After the war, Germany's heart, Berlin, was torn in half. East Berlin and East Germany were communist, colourless, and merciless. Everything was against the law; people were spying and informed on each other. Food was scarce. Too many people fled to the West and in 1961 the Berlin Wall arose. I never knew it happened so quickly and unannounced.

Music plays an important role

Lisette Lange lives in East Berlin but is in hospital in West Berlin with her baby boy, who has heart problems. The doctors want to do more tests and tell her to go home to rest and fetch clean clothes. When she gets up the next morning, the wall is being erected and soldiers are instructed to shoot anyone who wants to cross the border. She is separated from her baby. Lisette, who had experienced unspeakable horror at the hands of Russian soldiers in the war, falls into depression, she is unable to speak. Her daughter, Elly, with whom she had never developed a strong bond, decides to cross the border and fetch her baby brother.

Music plays an important role in the novel. Lisette was a pianist until she stopped playing, Elly experiences people's auras as pieces of music she hears distinctly.

Chapters alternate between the terrible war years and the nightmare of life in East Berlin, cut off and separated from loved ones. It's extremely gripping. It has a lot to say about collective guilt. The ordinary Germans claimed they didn't know what was going on in the concentration camps like many of us claimed about apartheid. But of course, there were rumours and signs. The book is a testament to human resilience and the urge for survival. The monstrosities that humans are capable of. The indelible scars that war leaves. I highly recommend it.

The Silence In Between by Josie Ferguson is published by Penguin Random House and costs R297 at Amazon SA.

I've also fooled myself into thinking I didn't like spy novels. The reason is nicely expressed by the main character in this book:

Gabriel considered the layers of duplicity involved in the case of Kit Caldwell. He felt his brain fug over.

It's extremely complicated to keep track of who is a double or even triple agent, of elaborate schemes and hidden agendas. The cold-blooded deceit, the unscrupulousness with which organisations such as the CIA and MI6 involve ordinary people in their operations and weave them into a web of lies.

However, I like the author – I see he is also one of Kate Atkinson's favourite authors – and I have read almost all of his books. William Boyd grew up in Africa and travelled widely. He is one of the authors who was asked to write a James Bond novel after Ian Fleming's death. In Solo, which I'v also read, Ian Fleming is a character.

It’s Bond world

Gabriel's Moon is mostly set in London, in 1961-'63. Gabriel Dax is a young Brit: privileged, intelligent, slightly arrogant. He's a travel writer who zips around everywhere and lives in an artsy apartment. He is in his early thirties, single and enjoys the company of and especially the sex with his girlfriend, who belongs to a different class and is a waitress at the Wimpy Bar. His mother died when he was six, in a house fire from which he narrowly escaped. He doesn't remember much of that night and is plagued by insomnia and nightmares. His cure is alcohol and now and then a sleeping pill. It's the '60s and everyone drinks like a fish – hard tack like gin, brandy, vodka and whiskey – and chain-smokes, anywhere. Many martinis are downed – Bond world.

Gabriel's older brother, who was in boarding school when the family home burned down, works for Foreign Affairs and sometimes asks him to deliver a package, quite mysteriously. Then MI6 engages him and things turn dangerous. He realises he is merely a courier, a useful idiot. He feels cheated, deceived, compromised. He develops an obsession with his handler, an elegant, sensual older woman. He dances to her tune and does what she says. He feels like a helpless puppet, abused.

Of course, he is uninformed and his assignments make no sense. He is well-paid, but kept in the dark. Then he starts fitting puzzle pieces together and thinking for himself. Can he outsmart cunning spies? These are the days of the Cold War, when spies are still spies and intelligence intelligent.

A web of intrigue

He travels to the Congo, Warsaw and Spain, among other places. He loses his innocence. In London he starts seeing a therapist who wants to help him recover his memories of the fire, so that he can sleep. The reader is helplessly drawn into a web of intrigue and realises how unscrupulous world powers are.

The description of a hedonistic but stressful lifestyle, of a young man's individuation process in the intelligence jungle is poignant. I highly recommend it.

Gabriel's Moon by William Boyd is published by Penguin Random House and costs R285 at Amazon SA.

What are we listening to?

Octopussy's theme song, “All Time High", sung by Rita Coolidge:

♦ VWB ♦

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