Venus, Vanishing by Rebecca Birrell: Art, deception and desire in 1930s Berlin

I snapped up Rebecca Birrell’s Venus, Vanishing, as soon as it was pitched to me. Opening in Berlin just as Hitler’s rise in popularity has begun, art historian Birrell’s first novel follows eighteen-year-old Hannah Sherman, determined to become an artist rather than marry into a life of domestic drudgery.

Elke wanted me to know how she felt and what she thought about. It was a given that I was looking at her. But her diaries made it clear she was looking back at me.

When her mother’s demands become impossible to ignore, Hannah leaves home, using her seamstress’s skills to pay her rent. Money and work are scarce but Elke Grese has sought Hannah out for the skills she’d practised in her mother’s workshop. Soon Hannah has established a life for herself: mornings at the Kaiser Friedrich Museum, sketching and looking; an hour in Saul’s bed; nights with Maria visiting Berlin’s clubs leading to an affair with Charlotte, a brilliant young dancer. Meanwhile, the papers are filled with praise for the politician the country is convinced will lift it from its humiliation. Anti-Semitism, once covert, becomes increasingly open. As Hannah falls under Elke’s spell, she finds herself caught up in a dangerous world, asked to practice an uncomfortable deception, discovering that her art work is being used in ways she would never have countenanced. By 1933, Hitler is chancellor: Hannah, Saul and Charlotte watch events unfold over the following years with dread.

Clothes were left in my arms with detailed instructions about alterations and were never collected. The wardrobe steadily filled with their ghosts.

Full of evocative descriptions of Berlin, art and clothes, Birrell’s debut is a gorgeous, immersive novel which wears its meticulous research lightly. Hannah is an engaging narrator, passionate, intelligent and vibrant; easy prey for Elke’s flattering attentions, blinded by desire for this beautiful, wealthy and sophisticated woman so apparently supportive of her artistic talent. Birrell’s principal characters are beautifully realised, the increasing horror of their situation summoned up by small details, their reluctance to tear themselves away from their friends, family and homeland entirely believable. This is a period and place often written about in fiction, but Birrell’s powerful, understated writing feels fresh, bringing it vividly to life. Certainly one of my books of the year, I’d love to see this one win a few prizes before 2026 is out.

Picador Books: London 9781035085767 384 pages Hardback (read via NetGalley)