What do you think?
Rate this book
The Mare
Hermine Braunsteiner was the first person to be extradited from the United States for Nazi war crimes. Hermine was one of a few thousand women to work as a female concentration camp guard. Prisoners nicknamed her ‘the Mare’ because she kicked people to death. When the camps were liberated, Hermine escaped and fled back to Vienna.
Many years later, she met Russell Ryan, an American man holidaying in Austria. They fell in love, married and moved to New York, where she lived a quiet life as an adoring suburban housewife, beloved friend and neighbour. No one, not even her husband, knew the truth of her past, until one day a New York Times journalist knocked on their door,
blowing their lives apart.
The Mare tells Hermine and Russell’s story for the first time in fiction. It explores how an ordinary woman could descend so quickly into evil, examining the role played by government propaganda, ideology, fear and cognitive dissonance, and asks why her husband chose to stay with her despite discovering what she had done.
Many years later, she met Russell Ryan, an American man holidaying in Austria. They fell in love, married and moved to New York, where she lived a quiet life as an adoring suburban housewife, beloved friend and neighbour. No one, not even her husband, knew the truth of her past, until one day a New York Times journalist knocked on their door,
blowing their lives apart.
The Mare tells Hermine and Russell’s story for the first time in fiction. It explores how an ordinary woman could descend so quickly into evil, examining the role played by government propaganda, ideology, fear and cognitive dissonance, and asks why her husband chose to stay with her despite discovering what she had done.
322 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 18, 2024
24 people are currently reading
1058 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 63 reviews
December 7, 2025
The Mare is the fictionalised account of the life of Hermine Braunsteiner who served as a prison guard in two concentration camps during WW2. It alternates between the points of view of Hermine herself and her husband, Russell Ryan. Each gives us a very different impression.
Russell meets Hermine in 1957 at a hotel in Austria where she is working. From the very beginning, he is besotted with her. She takes the driving seat in their relationship, whether due to genuine affection for him or because he offers a convenient gateway to a better life. He navigates the complex process of obtaining a marriage licence and facilitating their move to America. Their conventional married life is upended in July 1964 when they are confronted by allegations about Hermine’s past. Russell is unwavering in his support even as damning evidence is revealed during her trial for war crimes. You ask yourself, did he so want to believe the woman he married was not capable of such evil that he accepted her assurances she didn’t do the things she was accused of?
Hermine’s first person narrative takes us through her early life to the annexation of Austria by Germany and the outbreak of the Second World War. She takes a job in a brewery, then in a munitions factory before learning from a German officer with whom she is besotted about a job in a newly built women’s prison. The prison is Ravensbruck. She’s told its purpose is to ‘re-educate criminals through hard work,’ an explanation she naively accepts. (She’ll later tell Russell she only took the job because it was better paid.) Initially, she is shocked by the violence meted out to prisoners. Soon, though, it’s she who is threatened with punishment if she doesn’t ‘toughen up’ and praised for physical violence against prisoners. Eventually, she willingly carries out the acts of brutality that earn her the nickname ‘the Mare’.
One of the most chilling thing about Hermine’s account is her increasing nonchalance about the things she is witnessing and doing. She complains, ‘It doesn’t matter how many prisoners we gas, more just keep on coming’, as if they are a logistical inconvenience rather than fellow human beings she’s consigning to a horrific death. Acts of unspeakable brutality are treated as commonplace or justified as ‘necessary’. And as time goes on she even takes pride in being recognised by her superiors for her ‘efficiency’. It’s disturbing to enter the mind of someone capable of such despicable acts but somehow you can’t look away. You want to understand how someone could get to the point where they lose all concept of humanity. The author makes you confront that question.
The brilliance of the book’s structure is that we get to see the contradictions between Hermine’s own account of her actions and motivations, and what she tells Russell about her wartime experiences: the omissions, the obfuscations, the downright lies. Even more so at her trial when she continues to dispute the evidence of multiple individuals who witnessed her cruelty although we know what they are saying is correct because she has already told us so herself.
It’s possible I overuse the word ‘thought-provoking’ in my book reviews but I genuinely think it’s justified here.
The Mare is an unflinching exploration of humanity’s capacity for violence.
Russell meets Hermine in 1957 at a hotel in Austria where she is working. From the very beginning, he is besotted with her. She takes the driving seat in their relationship, whether due to genuine affection for him or because he offers a convenient gateway to a better life. He navigates the complex process of obtaining a marriage licence and facilitating their move to America. Their conventional married life is upended in July 1964 when they are confronted by allegations about Hermine’s past. Russell is unwavering in his support even as damning evidence is revealed during her trial for war crimes. You ask yourself, did he so want to believe the woman he married was not capable of such evil that he accepted her assurances she didn’t do the things she was accused of?
Hermine’s first person narrative takes us through her early life to the annexation of Austria by Germany and the outbreak of the Second World War. She takes a job in a brewery, then in a munitions factory before learning from a German officer with whom she is besotted about a job in a newly built women’s prison. The prison is Ravensbruck. She’s told its purpose is to ‘re-educate criminals through hard work,’ an explanation she naively accepts. (She’ll later tell Russell she only took the job because it was better paid.) Initially, she is shocked by the violence meted out to prisoners. Soon, though, it’s she who is threatened with punishment if she doesn’t ‘toughen up’ and praised for physical violence against prisoners. Eventually, she willingly carries out the acts of brutality that earn her the nickname ‘the Mare’.
One of the most chilling thing about Hermine’s account is her increasing nonchalance about the things she is witnessing and doing. She complains, ‘It doesn’t matter how many prisoners we gas, more just keep on coming’, as if they are a logistical inconvenience rather than fellow human beings she’s consigning to a horrific death. Acts of unspeakable brutality are treated as commonplace or justified as ‘necessary’. And as time goes on she even takes pride in being recognised by her superiors for her ‘efficiency’. It’s disturbing to enter the mind of someone capable of such despicable acts but somehow you can’t look away. You want to understand how someone could get to the point where they lose all concept of humanity. The author makes you confront that question.
The brilliance of the book’s structure is that we get to see the contradictions between Hermine’s own account of her actions and motivations, and what she tells Russell about her wartime experiences: the omissions, the obfuscations, the downright lies. Even more so at her trial when she continues to dispute the evidence of multiple individuals who witnessed her cruelty although we know what they are saying is correct because she has already told us so herself.
It’s possible I overuse the word ‘thought-provoking’ in my book reviews but I genuinely think it’s justified here.
The Mare is an unflinching exploration of humanity’s capacity for violence.
November 5, 2024
This is an incredibly powerful book that confronts difficult issues about the nature of evil and love.
By fictionalising the life of a female concentration guard, Angharad Hampshire is able to explore how ordinary people commit unthinkable acts of violence and how they live with themselves and compose their identity in the years afterwards.
Half of the narrative in told from the perspective of the man who chose to stand by his wife through the initial journalistic article that reveals her past, a long trial in Germany listening to victims testify of the horrors committed against them, and her prison sentence and eventual release due to illness.
It is expertly written by an author who always seems fully in control of both the darkness and humanity of her subject matter.
By fictionalising the life of a female concentration guard, Angharad Hampshire is able to explore how ordinary people commit unthinkable acts of violence and how they live with themselves and compose their identity in the years afterwards.
Half of the narrative in told from the perspective of the man who chose to stand by his wife through the initial journalistic article that reveals her past, a long trial in Germany listening to victims testify of the horrors committed against them, and her prison sentence and eventual release due to illness.
It is expertly written by an author who always seems fully in control of both the darkness and humanity of her subject matter.
October 14, 2025
3.5. Hermine Braunsteiner was the first Nazi war criminal to be extradited from the United States to face trial in West Germany. The person behind it, the famous Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal (he played a role in finding Adolf Eichmann) got his lead by chance in Tel Aviv. She was known as the 'Mare', because she took such pleasure in kicking prisoners to death. During her trial the witness testimonies against her not only included taking children from their mothers to be thrown onto the gas chamber-bound trains, but killing children herself.
And yet, after the war, she met a US Air Force mechanic, Russell Ryan, married him and moved to Nova Scotia, Canada, before finally moving to New York. She became an American citizen. Ryan knew almost nothing about her past, only that she had worked in a 'prison'. Then one day a man knocked on their front door. He was from The New York Times; he knew the truth about Braunsteiner, and was going to write an article about her. Their lives very quickly changed.
Hampshire's novel about Braunsteiner's life and trial, focusing mostly on her relationship with Russell Ryan, is an engaging read, though sometimes the writing left something to be desired. It is told in very short chapters, alternating between two timelines and two perspectives: Hermine is the narrator in the war-era chapters, detailing her life as a camp guard, meanwhile Russell is the narrator of the post-war chapters, dealing with their relationship and ultimately, her trial. Even after finding out the truth about Hermine, Ryan decides to stay with his wife, which is something Hampshire explores. That was the most fascinating element of the story for me: how could he stay with a woman after finding out what she did? I had hoped Hampshire would have delved a little bit deeper into it, but equally I understand the difficulty (and controversy) of mining and potentially inventing a real person's thoughts for the sake of character. Hampshire said in an interview that she read hundreds upon hundreds of witness statements so that the violence that occurs in the camp chapters are almost always accounts of real violence.
The story itself is horrible and interesting enough to warrant a read. Hampshire's dialogue is particularly wooden at times and both Ryan and Braunsteiner, as narrators, are clumsy at times (for example, after The New York Times reporter leaves, Ryan speaks to Braunsteiner and she admits that some of what he says is true. Ryan panics, goes into the next room and takes up the calling card the reporter left. The chapter could have ended there, but instead the final line is, 'I need to stop him from writing an article.' The novel is filled with these sorts of clumsy overstatements, as if the reader cannot figure out what Ryan is hoping to achieve by rushing to pick up the reporter's card). I would generally recommend it though; I'm not sure I'd ever heard of Braunsteiner, despite being the first extradited Nazi war criminal from the US. Even though it lacked some of the depth I was hoping for, I did find it a thought-provoking novel, particularly concerning Russell Ryan, the American man who decided to stay as her husband, despite everything.
And yet, after the war, she met a US Air Force mechanic, Russell Ryan, married him and moved to Nova Scotia, Canada, before finally moving to New York. She became an American citizen. Ryan knew almost nothing about her past, only that she had worked in a 'prison'. Then one day a man knocked on their front door. He was from The New York Times; he knew the truth about Braunsteiner, and was going to write an article about her. Their lives very quickly changed.
Hampshire's novel about Braunsteiner's life and trial, focusing mostly on her relationship with Russell Ryan, is an engaging read, though sometimes the writing left something to be desired. It is told in very short chapters, alternating between two timelines and two perspectives: Hermine is the narrator in the war-era chapters, detailing her life as a camp guard, meanwhile Russell is the narrator of the post-war chapters, dealing with their relationship and ultimately, her trial. Even after finding out the truth about Hermine, Ryan decides to stay with his wife, which is something Hampshire explores. That was the most fascinating element of the story for me: how could he stay with a woman after finding out what she did? I had hoped Hampshire would have delved a little bit deeper into it, but equally I understand the difficulty (and controversy) of mining and potentially inventing a real person's thoughts for the sake of character. Hampshire said in an interview that she read hundreds upon hundreds of witness statements so that the violence that occurs in the camp chapters are almost always accounts of real violence.
The story itself is horrible and interesting enough to warrant a read. Hampshire's dialogue is particularly wooden at times and both Ryan and Braunsteiner, as narrators, are clumsy at times (for example, after The New York Times reporter leaves, Ryan speaks to Braunsteiner and she admits that some of what he says is true. Ryan panics, goes into the next room and takes up the calling card the reporter left. The chapter could have ended there, but instead the final line is, 'I need to stop him from writing an article.' The novel is filled with these sorts of clumsy overstatements, as if the reader cannot figure out what Ryan is hoping to achieve by rushing to pick up the reporter's card). I would generally recommend it though; I'm not sure I'd ever heard of Braunsteiner, despite being the first extradited Nazi war criminal from the US. Even though it lacked some of the depth I was hoping for, I did find it a thought-provoking novel, particularly concerning Russell Ryan, the American man who decided to stay as her husband, despite everything.
October 30, 2024
This is a tricky book to assess. Yes, it is gripping - based on the true story of The Mare of Majdanek, camp guard at both Ravensbrück and Majdanek, daughter, wife, kindly neighbour, vicious brute. The psychology of how ordinary people became killers, torturers and sadists is partially what this story is trying to tell. It is also a story of love and blind belief.
Told in two voices, one 1st person (Hermine telling her life from childhood to being saved from the Red Army) and 2nd person, told by her husband, Russell, though the ‘you’ isn’t the reader, it is Hermine herself.
There is nothing held back about life in the camps, either the work camps or the death camps, and it makes for grim reading as Hermine slowly loses all sense of self, becoming as cruel and unfeeling as those she once despised. Her story, and her character, is built from trial transcripts, interviews etc with the fictional story binding the rest into a whole. His story is entirely fictionalised.
Did I enjoy it? Not sure enjoy is the right word. I’m going to think on this further, as I’m not sure about how I feel about the idea of the few being executed for collective national guilt. If indeed that is what the book was implying. Her crimes were real, maybe not all, but certainly more than enough. Her excuse was - that was how things were! What would you have done? Good question.
I’m curious too, when other female and male camp guards were hanged not long after the war, how did these other cases take so long to come to trial? And then for the trials to last seemingly up to six years. As i said, I’m still thinking.
Told in two voices, one 1st person (Hermine telling her life from childhood to being saved from the Red Army) and 2nd person, told by her husband, Russell, though the ‘you’ isn’t the reader, it is Hermine herself.
There is nothing held back about life in the camps, either the work camps or the death camps, and it makes for grim reading as Hermine slowly loses all sense of self, becoming as cruel and unfeeling as those she once despised. Her story, and her character, is built from trial transcripts, interviews etc with the fictional story binding the rest into a whole. His story is entirely fictionalised.
Did I enjoy it? Not sure enjoy is the right word. I’m going to think on this further, as I’m not sure about how I feel about the idea of the few being executed for collective national guilt. If indeed that is what the book was implying. Her crimes were real, maybe not all, but certainly more than enough. Her excuse was - that was how things were! What would you have done? Good question.
I’m curious too, when other female and male camp guards were hanged not long after the war, how did these other cases take so long to come to trial? And then for the trials to last seemingly up to six years. As i said, I’m still thinking.
September 25, 2025
This is one of the most extraordinary, harrowing, thought provoking and brilliant books I have read.
On their first meeting Russell and Hermine discuss plants and edelweiss. As their relationship develops, he wants to take her back to New York with him. It takes months to secure her US citizenship. They settle happily together, get a house and a dog. Then there’s a knock on the door and a New York Times journalist blows Hermine’s story apart, alleging that she served as a guard in German concentration camps. Witnesses have identified Hermine as ‘the mare’ a guard accused of extreme cruelty. This novel is based on the true story of Hermine Braunsteiner a female concentration camp guard. She had not told her anything of this history.
Short chapters move between Hermine’s past, the camps, her relationship with Russell; between Hermine’s and Russell's narratives. Hermine protests her innocence, ‘I only did what everyone else did back then. I just did my job.’ ‘If you had been me, you would have done the work too.’ Russell believes culpability lies with those in power, but nevertheless his narratives betrays doubt. Scenes in the camp document appalling cruelty. The structure made me feel like being in a courtroom, piecing together a story, sifting through evidence, weighing up housewife Hermine with The Mare. I found myself in the role of judge and juror. Three people were on trial..
Russell. Why did he continue to believe in his wife?
Hermine - Was she simply carrying out orders?
Myself - would I have done the same in these circumstances?
The author uses the medium of fiction so brilliantly, imagining dialogues, and allowing Hermine’s character to reveal itself through her own fictionalised narrative. She complains about her constant illness whilst showing no compassion for the prisoners; she comments, “Everyone here seems to side with the Jews.” She chooses the prison work because of the higher salary. One scene really stuck out for me as the prison guards head out for a meal in a horse-drawn carriage, “as if in a fairytale..’
This contrasts to the picture of Hermine the wife, the friend, the daughter. A woman devoted to her family, a hard and conscientious worker. Where do the two sides of Hermine intersect and how can she be both?
This book completely absorbed me. I found myself looking at old reels of Hermine’s trial, reading articles by the author and others and talking about it to anyone who would listen. I found this quote from the author, “The true horror of genocide is found in the similarity between us and the perpetrators, not in the difference.’
One of my top reads of 2025.
On their first meeting Russell and Hermine discuss plants and edelweiss. As their relationship develops, he wants to take her back to New York with him. It takes months to secure her US citizenship. They settle happily together, get a house and a dog. Then there’s a knock on the door and a New York Times journalist blows Hermine’s story apart, alleging that she served as a guard in German concentration camps. Witnesses have identified Hermine as ‘the mare’ a guard accused of extreme cruelty. This novel is based on the true story of Hermine Braunsteiner a female concentration camp guard. She had not told her anything of this history.
Short chapters move between Hermine’s past, the camps, her relationship with Russell; between Hermine’s and Russell's narratives. Hermine protests her innocence, ‘I only did what everyone else did back then. I just did my job.’ ‘If you had been me, you would have done the work too.’ Russell believes culpability lies with those in power, but nevertheless his narratives betrays doubt. Scenes in the camp document appalling cruelty. The structure made me feel like being in a courtroom, piecing together a story, sifting through evidence, weighing up housewife Hermine with The Mare. I found myself in the role of judge and juror. Three people were on trial..
Russell. Why did he continue to believe in his wife?
Hermine - Was she simply carrying out orders?
Myself - would I have done the same in these circumstances?
The author uses the medium of fiction so brilliantly, imagining dialogues, and allowing Hermine’s character to reveal itself through her own fictionalised narrative. She complains about her constant illness whilst showing no compassion for the prisoners; she comments, “Everyone here seems to side with the Jews.” She chooses the prison work because of the higher salary. One scene really stuck out for me as the prison guards head out for a meal in a horse-drawn carriage, “as if in a fairytale..’
This contrasts to the picture of Hermine the wife, the friend, the daughter. A woman devoted to her family, a hard and conscientious worker. Where do the two sides of Hermine intersect and how can she be both?
This book completely absorbed me. I found myself looking at old reels of Hermine’s trial, reading articles by the author and others and talking about it to anyone who would listen. I found this quote from the author, “The true horror of genocide is found in the similarity between us and the perpetrators, not in the difference.’
One of my top reads of 2025.
April 5, 2025
When done right, historical fiction can be very illuminating. The Mare is thoroughly researched and it shows. The story peers into the motivations and life of Hermine Braunsteiner, the titular Mare, and her husband, Russel Ryan. What could drive someone to work at a concentration camp and do such brutal things? And how could someone forgive that person? These questions are explored in harrowing, fascinating, and timely detail. This is a fantastic book from a brilliant author and well worth anyone’s time to read.
April 1, 2025
Dual timeline novel set in WW2 and beyond
4.5*
Dual timeline novel set in WW2 and after
This novel is the fictionalised account of the life of Hermine Braunsteiner. who served as a prison guard – an Aufseherin – in two concentration camps during WW2.
The chapters are short and punchy and move between the years during WW2 and the post War period in America. The chapters alternate between Hermine’s experiences during the war and her subsequent life with her husband Russell, whom she met in Austria after the war; Russell’s running narrative addresses his wife directly as ‘you’ as the story unfolds.
The structure of this novel, I thought at first, would be off putting, I am not overly fond of a storyline whereby one character addresses another character directly. I thought I would struggle to engage. Further, when the present tense is used, it needs a capable writing hand to confidently handle prose and can often fall flat, but here, it works well, as it offers pathos and immediacy – it feels like we are peering over the shoulders of the characters. This is very competent, snappy writing and storytelling and the chosen format works really well, as the narrative is propelled forward through the war years and beyond.
Hermine is an average Austrian young woman, who is in her early twenties during the war years. Work was scarce at that time and she was offered the opportunity of working as a guard at Ravensbrück, a burgeoning women’s camp. At first it seemed like a run-of-the-mill job but as the numbers of prisoners began to swell, the brutality rose incrementally – and much of the novel looks at the complicity of the overseers, whilst balancing the notion that the ‘warped logic of Nazism held you in its thrall’. Spurned by her early lover, she exacts revenge on the nearest humble being. She fell in love but was betrayed (or, so she saw it) and seeks to move to another camp. She lands at Majdenek, which is beyond description. Disease is rife and several times she herself is felled by typhus, coming close to death on at least one occasion. It is beyond intolerable and she requests a transfer back to Ravensbrück.
A couple of decades after the war, she is extradited and put on trial in Germany, examining her time in Majdanek and for the atrocities she is deemed to have committed there. Her defence is that she suffered repeat attacks of typhus and was confined to bed during the alleged mistreatment/killing of prisoners. She also ‘doesn’t remember‘, although plenty of witnesses are prepared to testify against her.
Her husband’s blind faith in her is, of course, rattled but he is a loyal soul who sacrifices his life and friendships because of his (almost) unwavering commitment to her. During the trial, however, he is shocked to the core by what he hears but cannot reconcile the woman he married with the eponymous ‘mare’ of the book title, someone who kicked prisoners to death with her steel capped boots.
This is a very interesting fictional rendition of Braunsteiner’s life, weaving a great many recorded events into the storyline and set against the unfolding political developments in Europe, Vietnam and the USA. It encourages the reader to think about the situation from a good many perspectives and ponders the notion of amnesia and whether it can be a physical manifestation when someone has behaved barbarically, or whether it is a useful tool to avoid admitting culpability. How can someone live with themselves when they have been responsible for murdering thousands? How, even, is a monster created?
Justice for the victims is fittingly served and the reader is left to reflect on the reading experience. This novel set in in Ravensbrück / Majdanek and New York is well worth picking up, the research shines through.
4.5*
Dual timeline novel set in WW2 and after
This novel is the fictionalised account of the life of Hermine Braunsteiner. who served as a prison guard – an Aufseherin – in two concentration camps during WW2.
The chapters are short and punchy and move between the years during WW2 and the post War period in America. The chapters alternate between Hermine’s experiences during the war and her subsequent life with her husband Russell, whom she met in Austria after the war; Russell’s running narrative addresses his wife directly as ‘you’ as the story unfolds.
The structure of this novel, I thought at first, would be off putting, I am not overly fond of a storyline whereby one character addresses another character directly. I thought I would struggle to engage. Further, when the present tense is used, it needs a capable writing hand to confidently handle prose and can often fall flat, but here, it works well, as it offers pathos and immediacy – it feels like we are peering over the shoulders of the characters. This is very competent, snappy writing and storytelling and the chosen format works really well, as the narrative is propelled forward through the war years and beyond.
Hermine is an average Austrian young woman, who is in her early twenties during the war years. Work was scarce at that time and she was offered the opportunity of working as a guard at Ravensbrück, a burgeoning women’s camp. At first it seemed like a run-of-the-mill job but as the numbers of prisoners began to swell, the brutality rose incrementally – and much of the novel looks at the complicity of the overseers, whilst balancing the notion that the ‘warped logic of Nazism held you in its thrall’. Spurned by her early lover, she exacts revenge on the nearest humble being. She fell in love but was betrayed (or, so she saw it) and seeks to move to another camp. She lands at Majdenek, which is beyond description. Disease is rife and several times she herself is felled by typhus, coming close to death on at least one occasion. It is beyond intolerable and she requests a transfer back to Ravensbrück.
A couple of decades after the war, she is extradited and put on trial in Germany, examining her time in Majdanek and for the atrocities she is deemed to have committed there. Her defence is that she suffered repeat attacks of typhus and was confined to bed during the alleged mistreatment/killing of prisoners. She also ‘doesn’t remember‘, although plenty of witnesses are prepared to testify against her.
Her husband’s blind faith in her is, of course, rattled but he is a loyal soul who sacrifices his life and friendships because of his (almost) unwavering commitment to her. During the trial, however, he is shocked to the core by what he hears but cannot reconcile the woman he married with the eponymous ‘mare’ of the book title, someone who kicked prisoners to death with her steel capped boots.
This is a very interesting fictional rendition of Braunsteiner’s life, weaving a great many recorded events into the storyline and set against the unfolding political developments in Europe, Vietnam and the USA. It encourages the reader to think about the situation from a good many perspectives and ponders the notion of amnesia and whether it can be a physical manifestation when someone has behaved barbarically, or whether it is a useful tool to avoid admitting culpability. How can someone live with themselves when they have been responsible for murdering thousands? How, even, is a monster created?
Justice for the victims is fittingly served and the reader is left to reflect on the reading experience. This novel set in in Ravensbrück / Majdanek and New York is well worth picking up, the research shines through.
November 12, 2025
After seeing this book reviewed and enjoyed by many people, and as it is being reprinted so it was a last chance to get it before then, I read it myself to see what it was all about.
Hermine Braunsteiner, a prison guard at Ravensbruck and Majdanek concentration camp during the war, age 20, became known as The Mare as she kicked prisoners to death, and was the first person to be extradited from the US to Germany to face war crime trials. After the war, she fled back to Vienna, met an American who she fell in love with and moved to America with him. He knew nothing of her past, and she was a perfect and kind wife who loved nature and birds and looking after her husband.
The novel, based on a true story, told in alternating narratives by Hermine and Russell, begins as a love story, and intertwines the brutality of the prisons and camps with normal life and how a person can go from filling beer cans to working as a guard for the Nazi regime. How can we reconcile the degradation and filth of life then, the killing, beatings, filth, sickness, starvation and cruelty with a woman who loved nature and was essentially kind. Do we do what we have to do, do we believe the lies, or do we just look away for fear of retribution ourselves? And is it fair to blame individuals for what a regime imposed and those within the system had to follow...
Relevant today, with what is happening and the hysteria that is being whipped up, we are clearly not there yet, but how far will people go when they are told what they should believe about a group of people. Plus it was war. No excuses for the atrocities at all, but it is a fascinating book that makes you wonder how did that happen and how did it go so far?
@angharadhampshirewriter #themare #booksreadin2025 #bookreview #bookreviewersofinstagram #booksbooksbooks #booksirecommend
Hermine Braunsteiner, a prison guard at Ravensbruck and Majdanek concentration camp during the war, age 20, became known as The Mare as she kicked prisoners to death, and was the first person to be extradited from the US to Germany to face war crime trials. After the war, she fled back to Vienna, met an American who she fell in love with and moved to America with him. He knew nothing of her past, and she was a perfect and kind wife who loved nature and birds and looking after her husband.
The novel, based on a true story, told in alternating narratives by Hermine and Russell, begins as a love story, and intertwines the brutality of the prisons and camps with normal life and how a person can go from filling beer cans to working as a guard for the Nazi regime. How can we reconcile the degradation and filth of life then, the killing, beatings, filth, sickness, starvation and cruelty with a woman who loved nature and was essentially kind. Do we do what we have to do, do we believe the lies, or do we just look away for fear of retribution ourselves? And is it fair to blame individuals for what a regime imposed and those within the system had to follow...
Relevant today, with what is happening and the hysteria that is being whipped up, we are clearly not there yet, but how far will people go when they are told what they should believe about a group of people. Plus it was war. No excuses for the atrocities at all, but it is a fascinating book that makes you wonder how did that happen and how did it go so far?
@angharadhampshirewriter #themare #booksreadin2025 #bookreview #bookreviewersofinstagram #booksbooksbooks #booksirecommend
August 13, 2025
Can be confronting at times but primarily does not focus solely on the holocaust victims but rather Hermine Braunsteiner, a WW2 prison guard who became the first woman in the USA to be extradited for war crimes.
it is both humane and inhumane and leads you to the question of whether Hermine's actions were the result of her circumstances.
Well written and constructed, particularly from the husband's point of view, who knew only fragments of his wife's past life and who dutifully remained loyal to her to the end.
Written as a novel, it was an excellent read.
it is both humane and inhumane and leads you to the question of whether Hermine's actions were the result of her circumstances.
Well written and constructed, particularly from the husband's point of view, who knew only fragments of his wife's past life and who dutifully remained loyal to her to the end.
Written as a novel, it was an excellent read.
September 7, 2025
Very interesting story but I couldn’t get past how badly it was written sorry
December 31, 2025
The Mare is a book like no other. It was deeply thought-provoking and made me look at the situation from so many different points of view. At times, what I was reading was shocking, but the story was handled with such care and restraint that it never felt gratuitous. The writing was impeccable, and it held me from beginning to end. This is a story I know will stay with me forever.
July 23, 2025
Thought provoking and unsettling
August 27, 2025
A tricky book to read. Very powerful as we try to learn from a history which repeats…but never again
January 22, 2025
This is a very well researched, well written book which deals in nuance and compassion even while it describes some of the darkest things humans have ever done to one another.
The narrative is split between Hermine in the 1940s and her husband, Russell, in the second half of the twentieth century. Hampshire tries to answer the questions How do ordinary people come to commit cruel acts? and How do kind people keep loving someone after they discover cruelty in that person’s past? Obviously these are not questions with straightforward, universal answers, but, through humanising the Ryans, Hampshire explores them and provides implied answers.
She is clear that these are fictional characters based on the historical figures, and not the people themselves. This is a novel, for all the factual historical content. As such is is well structured and the characters and settings are fully realised. My only slight quibble, which is a matter of taste, is that there were times while I was reading it when it would have been clearer if quotation marks had been used. Perhaps some of those ambiguities were intentional.
This novel seems particularly important now as right wing politicians gain power all over the world. Hermine Braunsteiner slipped easily, tiny step by tiny step, into being a tool of a totalitarian regime, and committing violence in its support. The world needs people to be aware of how that happens, vigilant to stop ourselves following the same route.
The narrative is split between Hermine in the 1940s and her husband, Russell, in the second half of the twentieth century. Hampshire tries to answer the questions How do ordinary people come to commit cruel acts? and How do kind people keep loving someone after they discover cruelty in that person’s past? Obviously these are not questions with straightforward, universal answers, but, through humanising the Ryans, Hampshire explores them and provides implied answers.
She is clear that these are fictional characters based on the historical figures, and not the people themselves. This is a novel, for all the factual historical content. As such is is well structured and the characters and settings are fully realised. My only slight quibble, which is a matter of taste, is that there were times while I was reading it when it would have been clearer if quotation marks had been used. Perhaps some of those ambiguities were intentional.
This novel seems particularly important now as right wing politicians gain power all over the world. Hermine Braunsteiner slipped easily, tiny step by tiny step, into being a tool of a totalitarian regime, and committing violence in its support. The world needs people to be aware of how that happens, vigilant to stop ourselves following the same route.
November 3, 2024
It's 1957. A young man from the US and a woman from Vienna meet and fall in love. They get married and move to New York to create a quiet life for themselves.
Until one day a reporter knocks on their door to talk to Hermine Braunsteiner-Ryan about her work as a guard in a Nazi Concentration Camp.
In two alternating storylines we learn how Hermine first became a prison guard because of the good pay and then gradually becomes more violent over time.
And how after the war she denies her role in everything that happened.
Her husband stays with her. Even when she loses her American citizenship and gets extradited to Germany and put on trial.
It is a hard-to-read book that explores the limits of justice, love and solidarity.
But most of all it is a story of ambiguity and cognitive dissonance.
Great book!
Until one day a reporter knocks on their door to talk to Hermine Braunsteiner-Ryan about her work as a guard in a Nazi Concentration Camp.
In two alternating storylines we learn how Hermine first became a prison guard because of the good pay and then gradually becomes more violent over time.
And how after the war she denies her role in everything that happened.
Her husband stays with her. Even when she loses her American citizenship and gets extradited to Germany and put on trial.
It is a hard-to-read book that explores the limits of justice, love and solidarity.
But most of all it is a story of ambiguity and cognitive dissonance.
Great book!
July 17, 2025
A fictionalised account of the life of Hermine Braunsteiner, one of a few thousand women who worked as a concentration camp guard. Living her life as a suburban housewife, her history catches up with her.
Jumping between her discovery, and the key moments of the path that led her to be a tool in the Nazi atrocities, we follow this young woman seeking work as the war breaks out. Following opportunities from Vienna to a factory, then the prison camp, her path to better pay to send home to her family seems so normal, even as it is disturbing. The slow emergence into horror and cruelty, the witnessing and participation in the most hideous of war crimes.
After the war, Hermine meets an American, they fall in love, and she migrates to build a life together with him. When the past comes knocking, this man is forced to question everything, and needs to work out who his wife is, what she was, and what he is to do as her husband.
A book to challenge us all about the always burning question - what would/are you doing in times of genocide and depravity of people's human rights? Are you caught up in the propaganda, the things you are told? Do you stand up for what's right, no matter the cost to yourself and your family?
Jumping between her discovery, and the key moments of the path that led her to be a tool in the Nazi atrocities, we follow this young woman seeking work as the war breaks out. Following opportunities from Vienna to a factory, then the prison camp, her path to better pay to send home to her family seems so normal, even as it is disturbing. The slow emergence into horror and cruelty, the witnessing and participation in the most hideous of war crimes.
After the war, Hermine meets an American, they fall in love, and she migrates to build a life together with him. When the past comes knocking, this man is forced to question everything, and needs to work out who his wife is, what she was, and what he is to do as her husband.
A book to challenge us all about the always burning question - what would/are you doing in times of genocide and depravity of people's human rights? Are you caught up in the propaganda, the things you are told? Do you stand up for what's right, no matter the cost to yourself and your family?
May 15, 2025
I'm not sure what I was expecting when I picked this up, but confusion was definitely not on my radar. Not about the story, which is a good one. This book makes you question who you REALLY are, deep inside, when faced with impossible choices. Morality, love, kindness, evilness, cruelty, and hate all live in our inner psyche, and they live closely, side by side. It may take a perfect storm to unleash it all, but it all exists in there.
The other half is politics. So few were punished for crimes against humanity. As I recall, Nazis were hidden all over the world, even in the US, within our government, for their knowledge of science. Was it fair to imprison old people who had committed heinous crimes in the 90s? Yes. Was it fair to hide and protect higher-ups considered useful to our governments? No. Absolutely not. Many of the companies complicit in the Nazi war machine are multi-billion dollar companies today, despite the history. I couldn't help but feel anger that, indeed, the smaller fish got nailed, while the brains behind the genocide walked free, with world governments' blessing. Very interesting book that makes you *feel*.
The other half is politics. So few were punished for crimes against humanity. As I recall, Nazis were hidden all over the world, even in the US, within our government, for their knowledge of science. Was it fair to imprison old people who had committed heinous crimes in the 90s? Yes. Was it fair to hide and protect higher-ups considered useful to our governments? No. Absolutely not. Many of the companies complicit in the Nazi war machine are multi-billion dollar companies today, despite the history. I couldn't help but feel anger that, indeed, the smaller fish got nailed, while the brains behind the genocide walked free, with world governments' blessing. Very interesting book that makes you *feel*.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 12, 2025
Wow this was an incredible story. This made me think about guilt and war crimes and responsibility…not just in Germany during WW2 but also with what is happening around the world today….
This is about a real woman who was a guard at a women’s concentration camp during WW2. She was living a peaceful life in America after the war when she is suddenly extradited to Germany and put on trial for murder. This was fascinating to read and by the end I still wasn’t sure if I was supposed to feel sympathy for her or not. Was her version of events true? Was she in denial? Was she evil? Did she feel like she really had no choice? Was she brainwashed? I will be thinking about this book for a long time, it deserves more attention!!
This is about a real woman who was a guard at a women’s concentration camp during WW2. She was living a peaceful life in America after the war when she is suddenly extradited to Germany and put on trial for murder. This was fascinating to read and by the end I still wasn’t sure if I was supposed to feel sympathy for her or not. Was her version of events true? Was she in denial? Was she evil? Did she feel like she really had no choice? Was she brainwashed? I will be thinking about this book for a long time, it deserves more attention!!
July 16, 2025
'The banality of Evil' sums up Hermine Braunsteiner perfectly. How a young, not particularly well educated girl from a loving family could become a brutal in two concentration camps is beyond understanding but the author makes a valiant attempt to humanise her while not condoning her crimes. It is also a portrait of a marriage, of the struggles of an ordinary man who discovers his wife is not the person he thought her to be. And the agonising of those existing in the camp are never overlooked. it was a difficult read but Iike Russell Ryan, I gained some kind of understanding of those small cogs in that genocidal machine while never ever being able to forgive.
August 21, 2025
“The Mare” by Angharad Hampshire is a haunting work of historical fiction centered on Hermine Braunsteiner, a real-life war criminal who served as a guard at the Ravensbrück and Majdanek concentration camps. Nicknamed “The Mare” for her brutal method of stomping prisoners to death, Braunsteiner became the first person extradited from the U.S. for Nazi war crimes.
Shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize, this book was sent to me by the author. Thank you, @angharadhampshirewriter , for the opportunity to read it.
Told from dual perspectives, the novel alternates between Hermine’s POV during the war and that of her husband, Russell, in later years. Russell, an American, was unaware of Hermine’s past when they married. Even after learning the truth, he remained by her side until her final days. His chapters reflect a complex mix of denial, loyalty, and heartbreak, while Hermine’s chapters show a woman trying to recast herself as a victim of circumstance, a “normal” person who claims she had no choice, even though she volunteered for her position and proudly brought her Nazi medal with her to the U.S.
The most chilling aspect of the novel is how ordinary Hermine seems at times, a woman who loves birds, who falls in love, who grieves her family. But that normalcy is undercut by horrifying accounts of cruelty, complete lack of remorse, and self-pity. She shows no accountability until the very end, and even then, her regret feels hollow.
Hampshire’s sharpest achievement lies in her stark contrasts: the guards complain of “harsh” conditions … tough beds, bland food, while prisoners endured starvation, beatings, and death. The author also highlights how cheaply some were bought into committing atrocities:
“The Kommandant tried to make it easier for us,” he says. “He promised us two large bottles of vodka and 200 cigarettes each as a reward. The thought of that helped to keep us going. I can tell you, there were a lot of sore heads the next day.”
Another powerful moment comes when Hermine mourns her own family members while remaining indifferent to the countless lives she helped destroy:
"How many lives have been claimed by war? I turn away, not wanting to see if there are any new stones next to Vati; I cannot face the thought of any more of my family dead."
This was a well-researched and disturbing novel, and a necessary one. We don’t often read about the roles female guards played in the Holocaust, and Hampshire brings that uncomfortable truth into focus. After finishing the book, I was compelled to learn more about the women of Ravensbrück and Majdanek; many were eventually tried and executed for their crimes, years after the war ended.
“The Mare” also asks us an essential question: What would we do in a system like that? Would we resist, or be seduced by comfort, power, and promises?
Shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize, this book was sent to me by the author. Thank you, @angharadhampshirewriter , for the opportunity to read it.
Told from dual perspectives, the novel alternates between Hermine’s POV during the war and that of her husband, Russell, in later years. Russell, an American, was unaware of Hermine’s past when they married. Even after learning the truth, he remained by her side until her final days. His chapters reflect a complex mix of denial, loyalty, and heartbreak, while Hermine’s chapters show a woman trying to recast herself as a victim of circumstance, a “normal” person who claims she had no choice, even though she volunteered for her position and proudly brought her Nazi medal with her to the U.S.
The most chilling aspect of the novel is how ordinary Hermine seems at times, a woman who loves birds, who falls in love, who grieves her family. But that normalcy is undercut by horrifying accounts of cruelty, complete lack of remorse, and self-pity. She shows no accountability until the very end, and even then, her regret feels hollow.
Hampshire’s sharpest achievement lies in her stark contrasts: the guards complain of “harsh” conditions … tough beds, bland food, while prisoners endured starvation, beatings, and death. The author also highlights how cheaply some were bought into committing atrocities:
“The Kommandant tried to make it easier for us,” he says. “He promised us two large bottles of vodka and 200 cigarettes each as a reward. The thought of that helped to keep us going. I can tell you, there were a lot of sore heads the next day.”
Another powerful moment comes when Hermine mourns her own family members while remaining indifferent to the countless lives she helped destroy:
"How many lives have been claimed by war? I turn away, not wanting to see if there are any new stones next to Vati; I cannot face the thought of any more of my family dead."
This was a well-researched and disturbing novel, and a necessary one. We don’t often read about the roles female guards played in the Holocaust, and Hampshire brings that uncomfortable truth into focus. After finishing the book, I was compelled to learn more about the women of Ravensbrück and Majdanek; many were eventually tried and executed for their crimes, years after the war ended.
“The Mare” also asks us an essential question: What would we do in a system like that? Would we resist, or be seduced by comfort, power, and promises?
June 8, 2025
I read this book in one day, I couldn't put it down. A harrowing book but it also makes you assess how you would react if faced with the same situation as young Hermine. It is also a story of intense love. Its a book that will stay with me long after finishing it. I can't recommend it enough.
July 14, 2025
Although I've read widely on before, during and after WW2, this is one of the best books I've read. You wonder how the brutal guards in the concentration camps could live with themselves afterwards, and how they were viewed by those closest to them, if they found out. This very well-written book is enlightening and totally unputdownable.
August 11, 2025
Really enjoyed this book, it’s challenging but loved the way it was written and going back and forward in time!
May 9, 2025
Disquieting fictionalization of true events is new way of looking at role of "ordinary" women in Holocaust, and another angle from which to ask ourselves: "what would I have done?"
March 15, 2025
The Mare loosely tells the story of Hermine braunsteiner, a concentration camp guard during World War Two. The story flicks between Hermine and her American husband Russell with first person narratives that really draw the reader into the story. We move between Hermine’s time as a guard and her life years later when she meets her husband and moves to America. We then see how her time as a concentration camp guard is discovered by a newspaper reporter, and we see how this shatters the world of Russell as the unknowing husband.
The author uses beautiful language and great use of literary devices (even if expected in places), and I especially enjoyed the use of paradoxical symbolism changing between flowers (life) and birds (freedom) to the use of farm animals (pigs and cows) when describing the prison scenes. The author succeeds at making the reader even empathise with Hermine in places before dragging you back to reality with distressing scenes at the concentration camps. The themes of power and propaganda feature heavily throughout and the novel makes us truly question what we would have done in Hermine’s situation.
The Mare is a thoroughly engaging story, that benefits from short chapters that flit between character and time. While it is difficult to read in places, due to the first person narratives it’s easy to feel like you are standing side by side with the events as they take place, making the story even more engrossing.
The author uses beautiful language and great use of literary devices (even if expected in places), and I especially enjoyed the use of paradoxical symbolism changing between flowers (life) and birds (freedom) to the use of farm animals (pigs and cows) when describing the prison scenes. The author succeeds at making the reader even empathise with Hermine in places before dragging you back to reality with distressing scenes at the concentration camps. The themes of power and propaganda feature heavily throughout and the novel makes us truly question what we would have done in Hermine’s situation.
The Mare is a thoroughly engaging story, that benefits from short chapters that flit between character and time. While it is difficult to read in places, due to the first person narratives it’s easy to feel like you are standing side by side with the events as they take place, making the story even more engrossing.
August 31, 2025
4.5 ⭐️
August 28, 2025
This is a dark and harrowing book that brings up so many questions about the nature of evil, the nature of devotion. Is there such a thing as just following orders. Who is to blame for the horrors of the Holocaust? The leaders, the idea men, the foot soldiers, the guards or is everyone in Germany at that time complicit. Would be a great book club discussion.
August 23, 2025
This is a love story, and a story about the need for justice after the holocaust. The author does not flinch from the horrors of the camps. The short chapters help to allow the reader to digest this in incremental doses. The story is told in the first person, which encourages empathy and identification with both parties. There is no approving of such horror, but the reader is left questioning how they would have coped and behaved. Russell supported his wife whom he loved. The novel will continue to make me think long after I have read it, which is the job of good fiction.
August 24, 2025
a pretty psychological book as you end up feeling empathy for some evil characters. a slightly different perspective to read about the Holocaust from
April 8, 2025
Quite a remarkable book, extremely well researched. Part historical document, part love story. Highlights how war can enable ordinary people commit the sort of brutality and violence that they would not countenance in normal times. Nazism and the Holocaust never ceases to fascinate and this novel is a very personal glimpse into its aftermath. Thoroughly recommend.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 63 reviews