A mere handful of November paperbacks after a very satisfying two-part new title preview, but all four look pretty enticing to me beginning with Walter Kempowski’s Homeland which opens in 1988, the year before the fall of the Berlin Wall. A journalist living in West Berlin is commissioned to write a piece about the former East Prussia where he was born in 1945 as refugees fled the Russian advance. ‘Homeland is a nuanced work from one of the great modern European storytellers, in which an everyday German comes face to face with his painful family history, and devastating questions about ordinary Germans’ complicity in the war’ say the publishers.
Marie Benedict’s The Only Woman in the Room is about a woman whose fate was also decided by the Second World War. Hedy Lamarr, as she came to be known, fled the Hitler regime and landed up in Hollywood where her beauty secured her future. A scientist by training, Lamarr had learnt secrets about the Nazis at the side of her Austrian arms dealer husband and had devised an idea to help defeat them. ‘A powerful novel based on the incredible true story of the glamour icon and scientist whose groundbreaking invention revolutionised modern communication, The Only Woman in the Room is a masterpiece’ according to the publishers. It sounds a little improbable but intriguing nevertheless.
Poverty is the enemy in Alessandro D’Avenia’s What Hell is Not, set in Sicily where seventeen-year-old Federico is asked to help at a youth club in a destitute neighbourhood controlled by the Mafia. While the children of Brancaccio lack Federico’s privilege, their spirit and will change his life forever, apparently. ‘Written in intensely passionate and lyrical prose, What Hell Is Not is the phenomenal Italian bestseller about a man who brought light to one of the darkest corners of Sicily, and who refused to give up on the future of its children’ says the blurb which sounds distinctly cheering.
One man looks set to make a difference in a negative way in Jeffrey Lewis’ Bealport which sees a 
financier buying the New England factory where his favourite shoes are made. The sale will have a profound effect on the people of Bealport for whom the factory provides both livelihood and community. ‘Bealport is a portrait of a place, at once sympathetic, mordant, unsparing, comic, tragic and universal, and of a way of life that is passing. It is a novel of a town, and to no small degree of every town in America and beyond’ according to the blurb which sounds right up my street.
That’s it for November’s paperbacks. A click on a title will take you to a more detailed synopsis for any that have taken your fancy, and if you’d like to catch up with new titles, they’re here and here. If past performance is anything to go by there will be very few books to look out for in December, but you never know…
Homeland sounds fascinating. Will have to try and persuade the book club to choose this. Also like the sound of Bealport purely because I love shoes. Which has to be one of the flimsiest reasons ever to justify buying a book.
I think it would make a great book club choice. Lots to talk about. Who cares about flimsy reasons when it comes to buying books!
I too like the sound of Homeland – a tricky, emotive subject.
Indeed it is. Interesting to see novels dealing with the war and its aftermath coming out of Germany over the past decade or so. Helped by a generational change, I’m sure.
Bealport appeals – I hadn’t heard of it before.
I think Haus are quite a small publisher.
They all sound intriguing in different ways but Homeland probably appeals the most…not that I really need even more books in my TBR pile!
A common complaint! Anything translated by Charlotte Collins is worth reading in my experience.
Wow Homeland and The other woman in the Room both sound amazing.
Homeland most definitely. Not so sure about The Other Woman… but I couldn’t leave that bit about Hedy Lamarr out.
Kempowski’s All or Nothing did well for us in the bookshop a few years ago, so I’m hoping this latest release will be in a similar vein.
Pleased to hear that, Jacqui. Fingers crossed for the same success with Homeland.
I’m usually not that keen on fictionalised real lives but Hedy Lamarr’s story is so fascinating that I’m quite tempted! Maybe I’ll wait and see what other bloggers make of it 😉
Good idea! I’d never heard that about Hedy Lamarr. I agree with you about fictionalised lives although I’d make an exception for Jill Dawson’s novels. She does it very well.