Two Brothers

I very much enjoyed Two Brothers by Ben Elton which is set in two time periods.  The first begins in Germany in 1920 when two boys, Paulus and Otto are born to their parents Frieda and Wolfgang Stengel a "secular" Jewish couple in Berlin.  At the same time the Nazi party is born and as all three mature life for the Stengel family becomes increasingly difficult.  In the other time period, 1956, one of the Stengel boys (name anglicised to Stone) is living in London working at the Foreign Office and he receives a letter purporting to be from the woman both Stengel boys had loved, Dagmar Fischer.  The Foreign Office persuades him to go to East Berlin to meet the letter writer whom they believe to be from the Stasi, and persuade her to spy for the British.  Paulus and Otto were two very different boys and the reader will learn the main reason for this.  Paulus is clever and always has a plan, whereas Otto is impulsive.  The story covers the years till the War The increasing humiliation and terror to which the Jewish population is subjected is graphically described at a personal level as it happens to the Stengel family.  The Stengel boys try to find a solution to their survival and to save their beloved Dagmar.  This is a very compelling story, characters well drawn, wonderful writing, hard to put down. 5/5