Customer Reviews
Serial misogynist? - By: mad_mushroom, 19 Jun 2008 
I'm not a huge fan of detective or crime stories. I've read a few of the modern crop. Starring world weary cops/forensic pathologists/police photographers etc who are so much better than their incompetent colleagues, yet drink like fishes at a curry contest & get off with every woman they meet. John Actor plays Monkfish etc. Yawn. But a detectivein Nazi Germany? That sounded interesting: historically intriguing, & ethically too. A policeman flounderingin a corrupt society, full of the echoes of history.
Unfortunately, what I found were all the usual clichés, plus a lot worse. Unreal dialogue, plentiful name-dropping: oh yes, & a low ranking detective who talks back to the likes of Heydrich, Himmler, & Göring.
Dialogue is often nonsensical. Like when Bernie agrees with Heydrich not to humiliate Himmlerin front of his SS subordinates - & then goes on to do just that. Plot devices are daft too: Bernie begs an armed assassin to shoot himin the head, not the stomach, as it'll save him a lot of pain (and thereby impresses us with Bernie's knowledge of the foibles of certain WWI era firearms). As if the assassin would give a damn. Talk about a crow-bar plot.
Furthermore, there's an unpleasant tendency towards misogynyin these books. They gloryin it. Admittedly men are killedin the stories, too. But Kerr seems rather hung up on plotlines involving the graphic torture & mutilation of women. I think it's just a tad sick that all three of these books recycle the same misogynistic theme. But that's just me I guess, eh?
And the final story: German Requiem. A cringe-inducing knock-off of The Third Man (though Kerr seems to be under the impression that it's his work that is the better of the two). Apparently German Requiem is about a `scandal that makes the wartime atrocities palein comparison'. All I can say is the atrocities committed by both sides during the war were rather more shocking than Kerr's petty storyline.
You want a real feel for history then read Len Deighton's masterful spy series: Game, Set, & Match; Hook, Line & Sinker; & Faith, Hope, & Charity; Winter: A Berlin Family 1899-1945. They positively drip the stuff. History, that is.
And then read Bomber.
Highly recommendable :) - By: Jan Jensen, 30 Mar 2008 
I can highly recommend anyone who is interestedin German & European history & want to have a interesting read at the same time.
I am at the same time an amateur expert on the period, & I have not found a single historical or geographical mistake, which is not the case with Alan Fursts "Night Soldiers", which I have also reviewed on this site.
All the Berlin Noir stories should be made into films :))
forgton your German history? - By: Peter Anderson, 22 Mar 2008 Supberb triple thirllers,If you have forgoten your german history 1937 onwards.This three books will remind you. Wonderfull detective stories interwoven with true facts from that terrible era from before ,during & after the second world war. Brillant read for teenagers or uni students that dont know much about this time, it might just show them genocide is not just a modern subject. Waiting on amazon delivering the nextin the series so as to read themin order. Hurry up amazon.
Peter Anderson Milton of Campsie Scotland
A German Sam Spade - By: steve b, 16 May 2007 Bernie Gunther is an ex Kripo (German CID) officer working as a private detectivein pre & post war Berlin. He is tough, cynical & wisecraking, but also honest & decent. In fact he is Sam Spade/Philip Marlowe transplaned from California to Germany. Bernie's job brings him into contact with historical figures like Himmler, Goering & Artur Nebe, the real life wartime head of the German Kripo.
Philip Kerr is one of those writers who can transplant you into a different world,in this case pre & post war Germany. In doing so he has created a number of slang terms which I do not know if they are real German slang but it does not matter as they sound right.
Berlin Noir contains three out of four Bernie Gunther novels, March Violets, The Pale Criminal & German Requiem. The first of these also concerns the German Rings who Mafia like controlled crimein pre Nazi Berlin. The Rings were destroyed by more violent criminals, the Nazis.
The Pale Criminal has Bernie recruited back into the Berlin Policein order to catch a serial killer who may be linked to the ruling Nazi Party. German Requiem moves to post war Berlin & Vienna with refences to the Third Man.
All three stand upin their own right & Mr Kerr can be congratulated on coming up with a new idea & for being able to create a milleu as well as being able to plot & write very well indeed.
Bernie Gunther is welcome & different addition to the ranks of fictional dectectives
A knight without armor in a savage land - By: Leonard Fleisig, 20 Nov 2006 
"A good story cannot be devised it has to be distilled." Raymond Chandler
Raymond Chandler was a master at taking a plot & distilling it into a taut, splendid story. Chandler, along with Dashiell Hammett, pretty much invented the "hard-boiled detective". So, when a writer,in this instance Philip Kerr, comes along who is repeatedly compared to Raymond Chandler comes along, I can't resist seeing for myself. I'm happy I picked up Berlin Noir and, even if Kerr is not quite Chandler, his stories are so well written that he need not be embarrassed by the comparison.
Berlin Noir consists of three Kerr novels, "March Violets", "The Pale Criminal", & "German Requiem". They each feature Kerr's exquisitely drawn detective Bernie Gunther. If you've read Hammett, Cain, or Chandler, Gunther is instantly recognizable. He's a tough ex-cop now working as a private eye. He's bitter & cynical & sees the corruption all around him. He also has an eye for the ladies as well as a taste for booze. But for all his flaws he lives up to a certain code; he knows the world isn't black & white but he has his own moral compass & lives by it - for the most part.
What distinguishes Gunther from Sam Spade or Philip Marlowe is location. Gunther is a German, & instead of Los Angeles, he makes his basein Berlin. The three stories are setin 1936 (March Violets"), 1938 ("Pale Criminal"), & 1947 (the aptly named "German Requiem") against the backdrop of the rise & fall of Hitler's Nazi Germany. He left the Berlin police once the force became nothing more than a tool of the new regime. The time & setting are perfect for a genrein which shades of grey dominate the palette. Gunther is tasked with solving crimes while navigating the Byzantine-maze of inter-party rivalries, many of which are deadly.
I was fascinated by Gunther & the world Kerry paints for him. I usually take a breakin between books that are part of a series but I couldn't do that with the three storiesin Berlin Noir. They are all well-crafted & suspenseful. Although Kerr is clearing paying homage to his genre the stories are original & not generic. In other words Kerr is not the literary equivalent of an Elvis-impersonator. He has written these stories within the confines of a genre but has not sacrificed his own voice. The plots are complex but not so complex that they cannot be followed. With each story the personality of Gunther becomes a bit clearer so that by the time the reader is finished with them, Gunther is really a fully-formed & very believable character.
Kerr has just published a new Bernie Gunther novel entitled "The One from the Other". I am about one third of the way through it. It is an excellent sequel made all the more enjoyable by having read "Berlin Noir". Highly recommended. L. Fleisig
