Berlin Noir: March Violets, The Pale Criminal, A German Requiem (Bernie Gunther, 1-3)

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The mysteries are first-rate hard-boiled stuff, with plenty of fistfights and other manly action, as well as twisting plots full of double-crosses and surprises. And even after the war, amidst the decayed, imperial splendour of Vienna, Bernie uncovered a legacy that made the wartime atrocities look lily-white in comparison . The Bernie Gunther novels are first-class, as stylish as Chandler and as emotionally resonant as the best of Ross Macdonald. And even after the war, amidst the decayed, imperial splendour of Vienna, Bernie uncovered a legacy that made the wartime atrocities look lily-white in comparison.

Who knows but Kerr weaves the minutiae of mundane daily life with the exciting plot developments very skilfully.His idea for Bernie came the moment he found himself wondering what Raymond Chandler would have come up with if instead of leaving London for Los Angeles, he’d gone east, to Berlin,” was how The Telegraph put it in a Kerr profile.

The first book take place in 1936: Hitler is on the rise, people like him, there are some weird laws, Jewish people are slowly trying to flee the country.A few more tidbits about Bernie, gleaned from the series to date: he served in the First World War and was awarded an Iron Cross, second class. What’s New for the 20th of August: Some favorite mysteries; jazz, country, RT, and a musical grab bag; a hoedown, a big dragon, Hellboy, and of course ice cream!

Bernie takes on a case for an attractive woman attempting to establish whether her husband, a particularly vicious Nazi, is alive or dead. However, I work with a woman who likes this sort of thing and I keep my eye open for books to recommend or get for Xmas gifts. is not above using a little blackmail to obtain Gunther's racially unbiased services to catch the real culprit. The Pale Criminal finds Bernie back on the force in 1938 on the edge of war when Berlin experiences the mad spree of a serial killer.By the way, while Kerr has some interesting female characters, there is fair amount of objectivization in the great tradition of noir novels that women readers might take offense to. I loved David Dowling's fabulous "… Station Series" books that were set in Berlin either side of the second world war, and enjoyed a couple of Jonathan Rabb's 1930's "Berlin Trilogy" books, well those that were actually in Berlin, so when Philip Kerr's Berlin Noir Trilogy "box-set" ("March Violets", "The Pale Criminal" and "German Requiem") popped-up as a daily Kindle deal I took a punt.

They are also a lot of fun with plenty of wisecracks and knowing cultural references(Third Man and Casablanca among the allusions), but for those in love with neat, puzzle like mysteries and happy endings need to travel elsewhere as these are grim. The books featured on this site are aimed primarily at readers aged 13 or above and therefore you must be 13 years or over to sign up to our newsletter. As head of Kripo, the Gestapo, and the SD (the Security Police), Reinhard Heydrich was Arthur’s immediate supervisor and a man who had distinguished himself by his ruthless suppression of all dissent during the 1936 Summer Olympics. A richly satisfying mystery, one that evokes the noir sensibilities of Raymond Chandler and Ross Macdonald while breaking important new ground of its own. Bernie as a character is an unrepentant wise-ass, and this aspect of his personality rings loud and clear in his presentation of himself and his experiences to the reader.

He occasionally experiences flashbacks and recurring nightmares, both symptoms of posttraumatic stress. I would be more interested in a non-fiction work that examined how the feelings of Germans toward the Party evolved in the run up to the war. He is only in Argentina for a few weeks when he receives an invitation from the head of President Peron’s secret police to investigate a murder that looks a lot like two unsolved murders he investigated back in Berlin in (when else but? Boldly asking for the temporary rank of Kommissar, Gunther finds that a murder hunt for a perverted criminal soon escalates beyond all his predictions. Having now finished the complete cycle of Bernie Gunter novels, I have decided to re-read from the beginning.