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The Leipzig Affair
The year is 1985. East Germany is in the grip of communism. Magda, a brilliant but disillusioned young linguist, is desperate to flee to the West. When a black market deal brings her into contact with Robert, a young Scot studying at Leipzig University, she sees a way to realise her escape plans. But as Robert falls in love with her, he stumbles into a complex world of shifting half-truths – one that will undo them both.
Many years later, long after the Berlin Wall has been torn down, Robert returns to Leipzig in search of answers. Can he track down the elusive Magda?
And will the past give up its secrets?
Many years later, long after the Berlin Wall has been torn down, Robert returns to Leipzig in search of answers. Can he track down the elusive Magda?
And will the past give up its secrets?
231 pages, Kindle Edition
First published November 10, 2014
13 people are currently reading
177 people want to read
About the author
Fiona Rintoul
8 books8 followersFiona Rintoul is a writer and translator based in Glasgow in Scotland. She writes fiction and articles, and translates from German and French into English. Fiona’s poems and short stories have appeared in anthologies and magazines, including Mslexia and Gutter, and she is a past winner of the Gillian Purvis New Writing Award and the Sceptre Prize.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 35 reviews
March 29, 2015
BABT
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05h3pmmDescription: A tale of love, betrayal and redemption in the dying days of the Cold War. Set in Germany both in the years before the fall of the Berlin Wall as well as post-unification, and encompassing the excesses of life in 1980's Britain.
Bob McPherson is Scottish and unemployed. He lost his highly-paid job in the City because of his alcoholism. His counsellor at the Alcohol Advisory Service suggests he look back to a pivotal point in his life - Leipzig in the 1980s, when the GDR held its citizens in an iron grip.
Naive, and innocent of the machinations of the East German state, Bob embraces life as a PhD student at Leipzig University. There he falls in love with Magda Reinsch, a student with secret plans to escape to the West.
As their love affair deepens, Magda and Bob are drawn into a web of deception and betrayal. In a country where the Stasi is always watching, no-one is quite who they seem and everyone has their price.
Bob leaves the GDR thinking he is responsible for a man's death and that he lost Magda because of it. Now, in revisiting the past, Bob may be able to uncover the truth of his Leipzig Affair.
Fiona Rintoul is a financial journalist and translator. The Leipzig Affair is her first novel, and won the 2013 Virginia prize for the best new fiction by a woman writing in English.
Readers: Douglas Henshall and Indira Varma
Abridger: Jeremy Osborne
Producer: Rosalynd Ward
A Sweet Talk production for BBC Radio 4.
1/10 Magda trains to be an interpretator, as a way to escape East Germany Episode 2: Magda's plan to escape to the West suffers a major setback. Meanwhile, Bob is inspired to leave his Scottish university and study in Leipzig. Episode 3: Magda meets her boyfriend Marek and tells him the bad news about her escape plan. Bob crosses the border into East Germany and arrives in Leipzig. Episode 4: Bob meets Magda for the first time and is smitten with her. But Magda and Marek already have plans for him that they must keep secret.Episode 5: Bob's dislike of Marek grows. Meanwhile, Magda and Marek make new plans for her to escape East Germany. Episode 6: Bob uncovers more of Magda's past but she is still keeping secrets from him and life in the GDR is getting dangerous for them all. Episode 7: Magda and Bob are each picked up by the Stasi who seem to know everything about them. Bob makes a decision he will regret. Episode 8: Magda's interrogation by the Stasi continues. Back in Scotland, Bob is forced to put Leipzig behind him and move on with his life. Episode 9: Magda's life in East Germany changes unexpectedly. Bob is forced to confront his alcoholism and then to reassess the events in Leipzig. Episode 10: Bob returns to Leipzig and uncovers some shocking revelations. Magda has some surprising news of her own.
April 7, 2015
Claustrophic story of life in the GDR and the effects following the reunification.
Fiona Rintoul captures life in the GDR very accurately. She describes how citizens had to toe the Party line or face a lifetime of even greater misery forced into dead end jobs and sub-standard housing. The author lived there as a British student so knows her stuff. Her descriptions of the Stasi interrogations and life in prison ring very true (I was shown round the Stasi Prison at Berlin-Hohenschönhausen by a former inmate and Rintoul echoes their experiences). I wonder if the author has read her Stasi file and discovered who was informing on her….?
I liked the portrayal of Magda being a genuine believer of “real and existing socialism” until a family bereavement undermines those beliefs and sets her on a destructive course of opposition. However, I did find the characters somewhat lacking in depth and when I reached the end it just felt incomplete.
As you can see I’m struggling to put my finger on exactly what’s missing. I wanted to like this a lot, but felt it just wasn’t all there. I think it’s the sort of book that on a second reading I would see very differently and probably end up giving 5 stars.
Fiona Rintoul captures life in the GDR very accurately. She describes how citizens had to toe the Party line or face a lifetime of even greater misery forced into dead end jobs and sub-standard housing. The author lived there as a British student so knows her stuff. Her descriptions of the Stasi interrogations and life in prison ring very true (I was shown round the Stasi Prison at Berlin-Hohenschönhausen by a former inmate and Rintoul echoes their experiences). I wonder if the author has read her Stasi file and discovered who was informing on her….?
I liked the portrayal of Magda being a genuine believer of “real and existing socialism” until a family bereavement undermines those beliefs and sets her on a destructive course of opposition. However, I did find the characters somewhat lacking in depth and when I reached the end it just felt incomplete.
As you can see I’m struggling to put my finger on exactly what’s missing. I wanted to like this a lot, but felt it just wasn’t all there. I think it’s the sort of book that on a second reading I would see very differently and probably end up giving 5 stars.
May 2, 2019
I’m not sure how I came by the electronic copy of this book, but must have been attracted by the title, the spiel and the fact that it had won awards.
The plot had promise, but fell into holes and finally fizzled away. The device of alternating chapters in the voices of the young Scotsman who went to Leipzig and fell in love, and the young East German woman with whom he fell in love, he in the first person and she in the second (why on earth would you do that?),
just didn’t work for me.
The plot had promise, but fell into holes and finally fizzled away. The device of alternating chapters in the voices of the young Scotsman who went to Leipzig and fell in love, and the young East German woman with whom he fell in love, he in the first person and she in the second (why on earth would you do that?),
just didn’t work for me.
February 2, 2015
Fiona Rintoul’s novel is set in East Germany in the 1980s at the fag-end of the GDR and then again a decade or so after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany. It is the story principally of a young German woman who wishes to escape to the west and of a Scottish student researching in Leipzig whom she meets and sees as her vehicle out. Subsequent events involve betrayals, interrogations, expulsions, imprisonments and deaths.
It comes as no surprise that the author spent time in Leipzig at the time the novel is set and that much of what occurs appears to come from a mixture of personal experience and anecdote. This aspect is very convincing and has a ring of real authenticity. Also, the years following reunification clearly portray the increasing disillusion of the East Germans as first they understand the depth of betrayal brought about by Stasi informants and then the realisation that the new Germany has its exploiters too. This aspect of the novel is very well done.
However, I did the find the central story less convincing, especially the romantic element, but also the behaviour of Marek, Magda’s enigmatic friend. The narrative artifice of the voice of Magda alternating with that of Robert in each chapter worked well (Robert egocentrically “I”, Magda more objectively “You”), and the story trundles along effectively to its conclusion. I did think Robert was far too self-obsessed and unsympathetic a character and Magda herself was selfish throughout; but maybe that is realistic, that people really are that way; it did however make the story more mundane than this reader thinks it should have been.
It comes as no surprise that the author spent time in Leipzig at the time the novel is set and that much of what occurs appears to come from a mixture of personal experience and anecdote. This aspect is very convincing and has a ring of real authenticity. Also, the years following reunification clearly portray the increasing disillusion of the East Germans as first they understand the depth of betrayal brought about by Stasi informants and then the realisation that the new Germany has its exploiters too. This aspect of the novel is very well done.
However, I did the find the central story less convincing, especially the romantic element, but also the behaviour of Marek, Magda’s enigmatic friend. The narrative artifice of the voice of Magda alternating with that of Robert in each chapter worked well (Robert egocentrically “I”, Magda more objectively “You”), and the story trundles along effectively to its conclusion. I did think Robert was far too self-obsessed and unsympathetic a character and Magda herself was selfish throughout; but maybe that is realistic, that people really are that way; it did however make the story more mundane than this reader thinks it should have been.
July 23, 2024
Promising story, but I found the execution wanting. It did not fully deliver, plot wise. Also, I need more closure than that poor excuse of an epilogue.
March 30, 2015
I heard of this from a friend listening to it being read on the UK's Radio 4. It had a special resonance for us as we were both exchange students at the KMU in Leipzig in the late 70's.
Fiona Rintoul expertly captures much of the atmosphere of the Honecker years seen through the eyes of the westerner and the disillusioned young "DDR-Bürgerin". I especially like that she creates Magda as a real person, not a cliché. A young woman questioning and resenting, but not yet ready to give up her ideals of a more honest, fair and liberal socialism. This is something I remember too - it wasn't as black and white as we grew up thinking in the West. People loved, laughed, lived. They thought a lot about their country, its failings and its potential - surprisingly far more politically aware in many ways than their equivalent in Western Europe.
The Stasi - the state security police - cast a shadow over everything. The Stasi ruin the lives and hopes of our main characters and the reading of the post 1989 Stasi files brings us to our conclusion in the book. This process, deciding whether to find out what is in the files and then dealing with the legacy of broken trust and unexpected deceit, is a common one among people in the East. It is painful for our characters like it was for many real people. Personally, I (like the other British students there with me) chose not to open my file. I still don't feel I could deal with the contents
Fiona Rintoul expertly captures much of the atmosphere of the Honecker years seen through the eyes of the westerner and the disillusioned young "DDR-Bürgerin". I especially like that she creates Magda as a real person, not a cliché. A young woman questioning and resenting, but not yet ready to give up her ideals of a more honest, fair and liberal socialism. This is something I remember too - it wasn't as black and white as we grew up thinking in the West. People loved, laughed, lived. They thought a lot about their country, its failings and its potential - surprisingly far more politically aware in many ways than their equivalent in Western Europe.
The Stasi - the state security police - cast a shadow over everything. The Stasi ruin the lives and hopes of our main characters and the reading of the post 1989 Stasi files brings us to our conclusion in the book. This process, deciding whether to find out what is in the files and then dealing with the legacy of broken trust and unexpected deceit, is a common one among people in the East. It is painful for our characters like it was for many real people. Personally, I (like the other British students there with me) chose not to open my file. I still don't feel I could deal with the contents
February 23, 2015
'It's another world over there.'
I loved this novel, it had me gripped all the way through. The setting and time period is one that I find fascinating having studied German, and I do enjoy/find intriguing a lot of fiction that involves events surrounding the Berlin Wall and the former East Germany. Fiona Rintoul has created two captivating main characters in Magda and Robert. She creates tension and suspense, and really conveys the atmosphere and secrecy of the times. Magda is studying interpreting in Leipzig, East Germany, in 1985, but is disillusioned with life and politics there, and wants to leave and get to the West. Robert is a student at St Andrews, and events see him ending up in Leipzig and meeting Magda, getting to know some of her friends, and becoming involved in her complicated world.
The story is told in alternating chapters with Robert's story recounted in the first person, and Magda's told in the second person. I thought these points of view worked successfully here. I felt Robert's character was fleshed out particularly well; his personal weaknesses and the moments from his business career added depth and dimension to the story. The novel concentrates not only on those days back in 1985, but also takes us to the present, with the Berlin Wall having fallen and Robert finally revisiting Leipzig and I was excited and nervous to travel with him there once more and discover what, and who, he would find there this time.
I felt absorbed in the tale as I read and I also felt that the author knew her stuff regarding the background and setting of her novel, and that she wrote in a balanced way about this period of Germany's history. Though Magda and many others like her felt determined, desperate to flee to the West from the GDR, and were very disillusioned by the country, the Stasi surveillance, the way some people were treated such as the tragedy that befalls Magda's brother, nevertheless many people also looked back at their former country with a certain amount of regret once it was gone. This is captured particularly well in a conversation between Magda and her father, after the regime has come to an end:
''Personally, I think we've paid a very heavy price to have bananas in the shops and shiny new cars on every street corner. I look around me and I see young people with no jobs and no hope. I see homeless people. Did you ever see a homeless person in our Republic?...'
He's jutting his chin out again. It's odd. You agree with much of what he says. It's true that things are not so wonderful in the the new Germany. The West Germans are arrogant. They think they know it all. People like you have become strangers in their own country. Everything from the past has been swept away, whether it was good or bad, without anyone asking if that's what the people want.'
It's sad to read that 'all the dreams from 1989 of building a better kind of GDR, creating a new kind of socialism, are long forgotten.' Fiona Rintoul gives us a picture of the hope and then the reality that many felt hit them after reunification.
I thought The Leipzig Affair was a really enjoyable, gripping read, well-written throughout. I'm really glad I read it and I will definitely be watching out for more works by this author.
I loved this novel, it had me gripped all the way through. The setting and time period is one that I find fascinating having studied German, and I do enjoy/find intriguing a lot of fiction that involves events surrounding the Berlin Wall and the former East Germany. Fiona Rintoul has created two captivating main characters in Magda and Robert. She creates tension and suspense, and really conveys the atmosphere and secrecy of the times. Magda is studying interpreting in Leipzig, East Germany, in 1985, but is disillusioned with life and politics there, and wants to leave and get to the West. Robert is a student at St Andrews, and events see him ending up in Leipzig and meeting Magda, getting to know some of her friends, and becoming involved in her complicated world.
The story is told in alternating chapters with Robert's story recounted in the first person, and Magda's told in the second person. I thought these points of view worked successfully here. I felt Robert's character was fleshed out particularly well; his personal weaknesses and the moments from his business career added depth and dimension to the story. The novel concentrates not only on those days back in 1985, but also takes us to the present, with the Berlin Wall having fallen and Robert finally revisiting Leipzig and I was excited and nervous to travel with him there once more and discover what, and who, he would find there this time.
I felt absorbed in the tale as I read and I also felt that the author knew her stuff regarding the background and setting of her novel, and that she wrote in a balanced way about this period of Germany's history. Though Magda and many others like her felt determined, desperate to flee to the West from the GDR, and were very disillusioned by the country, the Stasi surveillance, the way some people were treated such as the tragedy that befalls Magda's brother, nevertheless many people also looked back at their former country with a certain amount of regret once it was gone. This is captured particularly well in a conversation between Magda and her father, after the regime has come to an end:
''Personally, I think we've paid a very heavy price to have bananas in the shops and shiny new cars on every street corner. I look around me and I see young people with no jobs and no hope. I see homeless people. Did you ever see a homeless person in our Republic?...'
He's jutting his chin out again. It's odd. You agree with much of what he says. It's true that things are not so wonderful in the the new Germany. The West Germans are arrogant. They think they know it all. People like you have become strangers in their own country. Everything from the past has been swept away, whether it was good or bad, without anyone asking if that's what the people want.'
It's sad to read that 'all the dreams from 1989 of building a better kind of GDR, creating a new kind of socialism, are long forgotten.' Fiona Rintoul gives us a picture of the hope and then the reality that many felt hit them after reunification.
I thought The Leipzig Affair was a really enjoyable, gripping read, well-written throughout. I'm really glad I read it and I will definitely be watching out for more works by this author.
May 24, 2021
Forty-one alternating chapters in the voices of Bob, a Scottie student in 1980s East Germany, and Magda, a German girl who wants out and sees the gormless Bob as her way to do so. Things go wrong, of course (more villains than you can keep track of), and 14 years later the couple are finally reunited in what looks like the possibility of mutual salvation. It’s all rather formulaic if not quite predictable, but nevertheless quite competent and readable.
September 4, 2019
This book was good for a first attempt; it definitely had promise. But the publisher hype made it sound much more exciting than it was. Yes, there was intrigue, (graphic) sex, danger, but the book ended so abruptly it felt like whiplash. Perhaps the author thought she’d provided enough information to bring the story to a close. She does say that Magda moved on with her life, found a new career that she enjoyed, was a single mother of a young son. She had also started seeing a psychotherapist for PTSD, and had decided to stop being afraid and start speaking her truth—about her victimization and imprisonment by the Stasi. She started following one former officer (because he was the only one whose name she overheard in prison) and took photos of him, then displayed them (with others) in a photo exhibition in Berlin. The ex-Stasi found out and started harassing her, but fortunately she had a large male friend (Gerd) who protected her.
The relationship between Magda and Robert, the second main character, was also over-hyped, the real relationship not of true love but of infatuation, an affair. Their ‘romance’ was clearly one-sided from the beginning, clear to everyone but Robert. Neither knew the other well; he was just attracted to her beauty. There was no happy reunion a decade later. She didn’t even want to take the time to see him again once she knew he had traveled all that way to see her. Perhaps he just returned for “closure”, for answers one way or another. Why did he stupidly use the key he still had to Marek’s old apartment (now hers), though? To sneak in while she was out? What was he thinking?? Her big bear of a friend, Gerd, was waiting for him in the dark (what a coincidence), and when he identified himself, suddenly they were best mates again. As if!
When she and Robert finally sit down and tell each other their truths, it is anticlimactic. She tells him she never really loved him (no surprise). Neither character, in the end, is all that likable. Magda used Robert, Marek used them both, Professor H used Magda, Robert used Annabelle, the sister of his City colleague. He lived with her for 3 years and took her for granted the whole time, treated her badly, ignored her pleas for him to get help and pissed away a fab career by not getting help for his alcohol addiction. He also used his friend Chris, borrowed £££ from Chris’s dad to go on a bender, and didn’t even show up for his own da’s funeral. He let his mother down all the time, leaving his sister to take up the slack. Yes, he had a bigot for an academic advisor at St. Andrew’s, but at least he got IN. He had a huge chip on his shoulder about being ignored by the posh girls, about not fitting in. I don’t know about you, but I wish I’d had the opportunity to attend St. Andrew’s. I’d lay bets many others would as well. It’s hard to sympathize with this whiner (“whinger” in Brit-speak), especially when he got a brilliant City job as a result of his uni connections. He was a smart-arse, offended nearly everyone at some point, started a public brawl, and didn’t realize he was the only one to blame until it was too late. OK, I did feel a bit sorry for him initially, when he was a new, confused foreign student in Communist Germany, but that was the only time. He was hardly imprisoned for years like Magda.
I never understood Magda’s attraction to Marek given what a poseur he was, and of course his obvious attraction to men. The big mystery was whether or not Marek really escaped, whether he was shot and killed, or survived. Did he escape through the forgotten tunnel as planned? We’re told he is now teaching at Columbia U. in New York. So what was the shooting scene all about at the beginning of the book? It’s obviously Marek being shot at. Was that just a dream? Why does Marek feature so prominently in the beginning, then just disappear? Why was he even in East Germany, not in his native Poland? Better university in Leipzig? (Doubtful.) Or was Leipzig the only university that had an opening at the time? Why make him such a central figure then drop him? Why did he never even contact Magda, much less try to help her leave? What a jerk.
Anyway.
If this book had been a bit longer with more details about the characters, I probably would have given it another star, or half a star. I would like to have known more about Magda’s later life, her child, her friends, family, etc. Robert? Not so much.
One topic in the book that no other reviewer has mentioned (as far as I could see) is ‘doping’. This was all over the German press (East and West) back when Germany was divided. There had been rumors for years of East German athletes ‘doping’ (taking steroids to enhance athletic performance). When the truth finally came out, there was a raft of stories in the press about one scandal after another. It was in the news there so often that I’m surprised no one else here has mentioned it.
In the story, Magda’s brother was destroyed by doping. He was given steroids without his knowledge, told by his coach that they were just vitamins. Which really happened, all too often. It may have taken 15 years for his body to die, but he lost his athletic ability and his mind immediately. He was a star athlete who represented his country at the Olympics, a young man with a bright future. turned into a vegetable by his unprincipled coach who was provably under pressure to bring home gold medals. The East Germans were notoriously driven to win at all costs. Magda was livid that her father did not make a fuss when his only son was maimed, but he was a loyal party member and probably knew his career would be destroyed if he did, perhaps his whole family would suffer.
The fact that East Germans informed on fellow citizens is not news. They had no way of knowing who betrayed them until the Wall fell and the Stasi files were suddenly made available for review. I cannot imagine what a shock it must have been to learn decades later that a friend or family member—someone you loved and trusted—had betrayed you. In this story, Anna finds out who betrayed her, but that’s one detail I will leave for readers to discover on their own.
For young East Germans during the Cold War, especially those near the Western border, it must have been hell knowing freedom was so close yet beyond reach. I can imagine university students were especially desperate to leave, and were targeted by the Communist party. Like Magda, many young female students would have done anything for a ticket out, which their male professors knew all too well, and exploited. Like the despicable professor in this story who used Magda, promising her she would be chosen for the exchange trip to Great Britain, then didn’t come through and claimed the decision was out of his hands. Was she naive? Yes. But she was also that desperate to leave, and knew if she didn’t sleep with the rat, another girl would just take her place and might win the prize instead. (This reminds me of a TV series a few years ago about East Germany in the early ‘80s, called “Deutschland 83”. You’ll know the character I’m talking about if you watched the show. Which was fantastic, btw, for the story, acting, and sound track. ;)
The relationship between Magda and Robert, the second main character, was also over-hyped, the real relationship not of true love but of infatuation, an affair. Their ‘romance’ was clearly one-sided from the beginning, clear to everyone but Robert. Neither knew the other well; he was just attracted to her beauty. There was no happy reunion a decade later. She didn’t even want to take the time to see him again once she knew he had traveled all that way to see her. Perhaps he just returned for “closure”, for answers one way or another. Why did he stupidly use the key he still had to Marek’s old apartment (now hers), though? To sneak in while she was out? What was he thinking?? Her big bear of a friend, Gerd, was waiting for him in the dark (what a coincidence), and when he identified himself, suddenly they were best mates again. As if!
When she and Robert finally sit down and tell each other their truths, it is anticlimactic. She tells him she never really loved him (no surprise). Neither character, in the end, is all that likable. Magda used Robert, Marek used them both, Professor H used Magda, Robert used Annabelle, the sister of his City colleague. He lived with her for 3 years and took her for granted the whole time, treated her badly, ignored her pleas for him to get help and pissed away a fab career by not getting help for his alcohol addiction. He also used his friend Chris, borrowed £££ from Chris’s dad to go on a bender, and didn’t even show up for his own da’s funeral. He let his mother down all the time, leaving his sister to take up the slack. Yes, he had a bigot for an academic advisor at St. Andrew’s, but at least he got IN. He had a huge chip on his shoulder about being ignored by the posh girls, about not fitting in. I don’t know about you, but I wish I’d had the opportunity to attend St. Andrew’s. I’d lay bets many others would as well. It’s hard to sympathize with this whiner (“whinger” in Brit-speak), especially when he got a brilliant City job as a result of his uni connections. He was a smart-arse, offended nearly everyone at some point, started a public brawl, and didn’t realize he was the only one to blame until it was too late. OK, I did feel a bit sorry for him initially, when he was a new, confused foreign student in Communist Germany, but that was the only time. He was hardly imprisoned for years like Magda.
I never understood Magda’s attraction to Marek given what a poseur he was, and of course his obvious attraction to men. The big mystery was whether or not Marek really escaped, whether he was shot and killed, or survived. Did he escape through the forgotten tunnel as planned? We’re told he is now teaching at Columbia U. in New York. So what was the shooting scene all about at the beginning of the book? It’s obviously Marek being shot at. Was that just a dream? Why does Marek feature so prominently in the beginning, then just disappear? Why was he even in East Germany, not in his native Poland? Better university in Leipzig? (Doubtful.) Or was Leipzig the only university that had an opening at the time? Why make him such a central figure then drop him? Why did he never even contact Magda, much less try to help her leave? What a jerk.
Anyway.
If this book had been a bit longer with more details about the characters, I probably would have given it another star, or half a star. I would like to have known more about Magda’s later life, her child, her friends, family, etc. Robert? Not so much.
One topic in the book that no other reviewer has mentioned (as far as I could see) is ‘doping’. This was all over the German press (East and West) back when Germany was divided. There had been rumors for years of East German athletes ‘doping’ (taking steroids to enhance athletic performance). When the truth finally came out, there was a raft of stories in the press about one scandal after another. It was in the news there so often that I’m surprised no one else here has mentioned it.
In the story, Magda’s brother was destroyed by doping. He was given steroids without his knowledge, told by his coach that they were just vitamins. Which really happened, all too often. It may have taken 15 years for his body to die, but he lost his athletic ability and his mind immediately. He was a star athlete who represented his country at the Olympics, a young man with a bright future. turned into a vegetable by his unprincipled coach who was provably under pressure to bring home gold medals. The East Germans were notoriously driven to win at all costs. Magda was livid that her father did not make a fuss when his only son was maimed, but he was a loyal party member and probably knew his career would be destroyed if he did, perhaps his whole family would suffer.
The fact that East Germans informed on fellow citizens is not news. They had no way of knowing who betrayed them until the Wall fell and the Stasi files were suddenly made available for review. I cannot imagine what a shock it must have been to learn decades later that a friend or family member—someone you loved and trusted—had betrayed you. In this story, Anna finds out who betrayed her, but that’s one detail I will leave for readers to discover on their own.
For young East Germans during the Cold War, especially those near the Western border, it must have been hell knowing freedom was so close yet beyond reach. I can imagine university students were especially desperate to leave, and were targeted by the Communist party. Like Magda, many young female students would have done anything for a ticket out, which their male professors knew all too well, and exploited. Like the despicable professor in this story who used Magda, promising her she would be chosen for the exchange trip to Great Britain, then didn’t come through and claimed the decision was out of his hands. Was she naive? Yes. But she was also that desperate to leave, and knew if she didn’t sleep with the rat, another girl would just take her place and might win the prize instead. (This reminds me of a TV series a few years ago about East Germany in the early ‘80s, called “Deutschland 83”. You’ll know the character I’m talking about if you watched the show. Which was fantastic, btw, for the story, acting, and sound track. ;)
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 28, 2015
A tale of love, betrayal and redemption in the dying days of the Cold War. Set in Germany both in the years before the fall of the Berlin Wall as well as post-unification, and encompassing the excesses of life in 1980's Britain.
Bob McPherson is Scottish and unemployed. He lost his highly-paid job in the City because of his alcoholism. His counsellor at the Alcohol Advisory Service suggests he look back to a pivotal point in his life - Leipzig in the 1980s, when the GDR held its citizens in an iron grip.
Naive, and innocent of the machinations of the East German state, Bob embraces life as a PhD student at Leipzig University. There he falls in love with Magda Reinsch, a student with secret plans to escape to the West.
As their love affair deepens, Magda and Bob are drawn into a web of deception and betrayal. In a country where the Stasi is always watching, no-one is quite who they seem and everyone has their price.
Bob leaves the GDR thinking he is responsible for a man's death and that he lost Magda because of it. Now, in revisiting the past, Bob may be able to uncover the truth of his Leipzig Affair.
Fiona Rintoul is a financial journalist and translator. The Leipzig Affair is her first novel, and won the 2013 Virginia prize for the best new fiction by a woman writing in English.
Bob McPherson is Scottish and unemployed. He lost his highly-paid job in the City because of his alcoholism. His counsellor at the Alcohol Advisory Service suggests he look back to a pivotal point in his life - Leipzig in the 1980s, when the GDR held its citizens in an iron grip.
Naive, and innocent of the machinations of the East German state, Bob embraces life as a PhD student at Leipzig University. There he falls in love with Magda Reinsch, a student with secret plans to escape to the West.
As their love affair deepens, Magda and Bob are drawn into a web of deception and betrayal. In a country where the Stasi is always watching, no-one is quite who they seem and everyone has their price.
Bob leaves the GDR thinking he is responsible for a man's death and that he lost Magda because of it. Now, in revisiting the past, Bob may be able to uncover the truth of his Leipzig Affair.
Fiona Rintoul is a financial journalist and translator. The Leipzig Affair is her first novel, and won the 2013 Virginia prize for the best new fiction by a woman writing in English.
March 28, 2015
From BBC Radio 4 - Book at Bedtime:
A tale of love, betrayal and redemption in the dying days of the Cold War. Set in Germany both in the years before the fall of the Berlin Wall as well as post-unification, and encompassing the excesses of life in 1980's Britain.
Bob McPherson is Scottish and unemployed. He lost his highly-paid job in the City because of his alcoholism. His counsellor at the Alcohol Advisory Service suggests he look back to a pivotal point in his life - Leipzig in the 1980s, when the GDR held its citizens in an iron grip.
Naive, and innocent of the machinations of the East German state, Bob embraces life as a PhD student at Leipzig University. There he falls in love with Magda Reinsch, a student with secret plans to escape to the West.
As their love affair deepens, Magda and Bob are drawn into a web of deception and betrayal. In a country where the Stasi is always watching, no-one is quite who they seem and everyone has their price.
Bob leaves the GDR thinking he is responsible for a man's death and that he lost Magda because of it. Now, in revisiting the past, Bob may be able to uncover the truth of his Leipzig Affair.
A tale of love, betrayal and redemption in the dying days of the Cold War. Set in Germany both in the years before the fall of the Berlin Wall as well as post-unification, and encompassing the excesses of life in 1980's Britain.
Bob McPherson is Scottish and unemployed. He lost his highly-paid job in the City because of his alcoholism. His counsellor at the Alcohol Advisory Service suggests he look back to a pivotal point in his life - Leipzig in the 1980s, when the GDR held its citizens in an iron grip.
Naive, and innocent of the machinations of the East German state, Bob embraces life as a PhD student at Leipzig University. There he falls in love with Magda Reinsch, a student with secret plans to escape to the West.
As their love affair deepens, Magda and Bob are drawn into a web of deception and betrayal. In a country where the Stasi is always watching, no-one is quite who they seem and everyone has their price.
Bob leaves the GDR thinking he is responsible for a man's death and that he lost Magda because of it. Now, in revisiting the past, Bob may be able to uncover the truth of his Leipzig Affair.
November 25, 2014
Excellent human drama spanning east and west from the DDR to unification era Germany.
February 16, 2018
I'm a little tired of story lines with alternating voices in alternating chapters. I hate the interruptions. And I'm not fond of the second-person either. But lately I'm obsessed with East Germany. This is very satisfying.
...someone who has spent his entire life manipulating his way to the top in a system where favour counts for everything and merit for very little.
Nothing is more frightening to a former prisoner than freedom.
"You know," he says, "when the border was sealed in 1961 people were happy. It meant no more sabotage from the West. No more doctors and dentists disappearing over the border to earn more money. No more disruptions to production because essential workers were bring lured away by capitalist bribes. It gave us a firm base on which to build the fairer society we were trying to create. That's what people wanted. You probably can't even begin to imagine what it was like back then. We'd come through the bloodiest war in history. Our country had been brought to the brink of destruction by National Socialism. We wanted to build something better: a new Germany based on the principles of equality and socialism."
He smiles and you try to smile back. What he says isn't untrue. But it's not the whole truth either.
"But you didn't create a better, fairer society," you say. "That's the problem."
"Well, I won't deny there were problems. But there are problems in every society. At least we tried to make something that was better. At least we had something to believe in and work towards. We were working towards communism and we were happy. What do people believe in today?"
You look at the table. You don't have an answer to that question. "Things happened that can't be excused," you say.
"Well, you're entitled to your opinion." He pats your hand. "You've always had firm views."
"Huh," says Herr Witzlack, lighting a cigarette. "All women have firm views."
Your father appears not to hear him. Instead, he looks into your eyes and, speaking very quietly, says, "I'm sorry."
You nod. "I know."
Suddenly, you feel sorry for him. He's been lying to himself all these years. Imagine the strain.
They're acknowledged now as masters of a technique known as Zersetzung. It means decomposition. They broke people down by destroying their self-confidence and their relationships.
notes: Stefan Heym, 4 November 1989, Alexanderplatz: "Socialism--not the Stalinist kind, the real kind--is unthinkable without democracy.
How might you have felt then if you'd known what was to come? People talk now about reunification as though it were a victory... But the truth is that for people like you, the people who fought for democratic socialism in East Germany, it was a defeat.
The irony is that they had all this data, but they ended up knowing nothing. They didn't see the end coming.
"Was it ethical to help to prop up a system that put young women in prison for no reason because you thought it was cool to wear second-hand suits and call yourself a Communist?"
...someone who has spent his entire life manipulating his way to the top in a system where favour counts for everything and merit for very little.
Nothing is more frightening to a former prisoner than freedom.
"You know," he says, "when the border was sealed in 1961 people were happy. It meant no more sabotage from the West. No more doctors and dentists disappearing over the border to earn more money. No more disruptions to production because essential workers were bring lured away by capitalist bribes. It gave us a firm base on which to build the fairer society we were trying to create. That's what people wanted. You probably can't even begin to imagine what it was like back then. We'd come through the bloodiest war in history. Our country had been brought to the brink of destruction by National Socialism. We wanted to build something better: a new Germany based on the principles of equality and socialism."
He smiles and you try to smile back. What he says isn't untrue. But it's not the whole truth either.
"But you didn't create a better, fairer society," you say. "That's the problem."
"Well, I won't deny there were problems. But there are problems in every society. At least we tried to make something that was better. At least we had something to believe in and work towards. We were working towards communism and we were happy. What do people believe in today?"
You look at the table. You don't have an answer to that question. "Things happened that can't be excused," you say.
"Well, you're entitled to your opinion." He pats your hand. "You've always had firm views."
"Huh," says Herr Witzlack, lighting a cigarette. "All women have firm views."
Your father appears not to hear him. Instead, he looks into your eyes and, speaking very quietly, says, "I'm sorry."
You nod. "I know."
Suddenly, you feel sorry for him. He's been lying to himself all these years. Imagine the strain.
They're acknowledged now as masters of a technique known as Zersetzung. It means decomposition. They broke people down by destroying their self-confidence and their relationships.
notes: Stefan Heym, 4 November 1989, Alexanderplatz: "Socialism--not the Stalinist kind, the real kind--is unthinkable without democracy.
How might you have felt then if you'd known what was to come? People talk now about reunification as though it were a victory... But the truth is that for people like you, the people who fought for democratic socialism in East Germany, it was a defeat.
The irony is that they had all this data, but they ended up knowing nothing. They didn't see the end coming.
"Was it ethical to help to prop up a system that put young women in prison for no reason because you thought it was cool to wear second-hand suits and call yourself a Communist?"
December 16, 2017
The Leipzig Affair is a cold war thriller.
The story opens with Bob recalling the death of Marek, for which he blames himself; this sets an intriguing, dark tone to the book.
The story then turns to 1985, Leipzig, East Germany. Magda is training to be an English interpreter and translator; her hopes are pinned on winning a place on a study programme in Great Britain, so that she may escape the strict socialist regime she rebels against.
Magda once believed in socialism, but when her brother, an Olympic athlete, fell seriously ill, she thought there was a cover-up and for her, a dangerous disbelief set in. For a while she tried to break free, but her father held a powerful position, so she pretended to conform, whilst plotting her escape.
Robert McPherson was granted a one year study visa for East Germany, and smuggling in banned clothing. He was already a target for Magda’s plans, but when the Stasi arrest him and throw him out of the country he becomes consumed with guilt, convinced he’s signed a man’s death warrant.
This is the story of two people: Robert who spent years hiding in a drunken haze of guilt, and Magda, whose life was tossed around by others in a dangerous cloak and shadow game. The mind games of the Stasi are notorious and this book gave an interesting insight. Even after ‘The Wall’ came down it didn’t instantly solve all the problems, nor could it wipe away the events which scarred many lives. This isn’t a thriller filled with gruesome murders but the chilling feeling left by twists and turns of spies, when you really don’t know who you can trust. Ideal for those with an interest in tales from the cold war era.
The story opens with Bob recalling the death of Marek, for which he blames himself; this sets an intriguing, dark tone to the book.
The story then turns to 1985, Leipzig, East Germany. Magda is training to be an English interpreter and translator; her hopes are pinned on winning a place on a study programme in Great Britain, so that she may escape the strict socialist regime she rebels against.
Magda once believed in socialism, but when her brother, an Olympic athlete, fell seriously ill, she thought there was a cover-up and for her, a dangerous disbelief set in. For a while she tried to break free, but her father held a powerful position, so she pretended to conform, whilst plotting her escape.
Robert McPherson was granted a one year study visa for East Germany, and smuggling in banned clothing. He was already a target for Magda’s plans, but when the Stasi arrest him and throw him out of the country he becomes consumed with guilt, convinced he’s signed a man’s death warrant.
This is the story of two people: Robert who spent years hiding in a drunken haze of guilt, and Magda, whose life was tossed around by others in a dangerous cloak and shadow game. The mind games of the Stasi are notorious and this book gave an interesting insight. Even after ‘The Wall’ came down it didn’t instantly solve all the problems, nor could it wipe away the events which scarred many lives. This isn’t a thriller filled with gruesome murders but the chilling feeling left by twists and turns of spies, when you really don’t know who you can trust. Ideal for those with an interest in tales from the cold war era.
December 14, 2022
Fiona Rintoul's "The Leipzig Affair" demands a lot of a reader, with its complex story about the conflicted loyalties and difficult choices made for by Cold War life under the Stasi. Complicating things is a second-person narration from the novel's female principal which put me in mind of another second-person novel of recent years, Vendela Vida's "The Diver's Clothes Lie Empty," easily the most interesting novel technically I've read in a long time. Indeed, it was what Vida did with the second-person presentation that made for the initial attraction for me of Rintoul’s novel, though in her case I couldn't help thinking that the second-person sections perhaps only made for undue additional complexity in a novel already complicated enough with its depiction of state intrusion into personal lives so corrosive that it renders its male principal an alcoholic. Indeed, so vividly depicted is his state – the scenes with his alcohol counselor and his put-upon boss are particularly compelling – as to put me in mind of ”The Lost Weekend” and “Days of Wine and Roses” and thinking that the author might perhaps have more profitably made him the centerpiece of her story. Nevertheless, the novel as written, however put-offish the female character's second-person sections might be for more casual readers or fascinating to students of literature, is of considerable interest, both as a picture of life under constant government surveillance and as a distinct narrative achievement.
February 25, 2021
It was an easy and capturing read. As I was farther along with the story, it was harder to put the book down. It provides a glimpse of life in the GDR, living among the IMs with hardly any freedom.
At the beginning of the story, I was annoyed that Magda was playing with Bob's emotions. I was annoyed at Magda and Marek even though they were not entirely responsible for all the problems in Bob's life. But I started sympathizing with Magda when she became a victim of deception herself.
Part Two engages with the first twists in the story after the fall of the Berlin wall. Although I could determine who the IMs were, it still did not stop me from empathizing with the characters when revealed. After all, it wasn't a mystery/thriller. ;) Well-written wrap!
I liked two things about the story.
- The ending: It wasn't a cheesy ending as I expected it to be. Very pleased!
- The overall pace of the story.
The one thing I did not like about the book was the changing POVs(I and you). I am generally not picky about the POVs, but the intended narrator is hard to determine.
At the beginning of the story, I was annoyed that Magda was playing with Bob's emotions. I was annoyed at Magda and Marek even though they were not entirely responsible for all the problems in Bob's life. But I started sympathizing with Magda when she became a victim of deception herself.
Part Two engages with the first twists in the story after the fall of the Berlin wall. Although I could determine who the IMs were, it still did not stop me from empathizing with the characters when revealed. After all, it wasn't a mystery/thriller. ;) Well-written wrap!
I liked two things about the story.
- The ending: It wasn't a cheesy ending as I expected it to be. Very pleased!
- The overall pace of the story.
The one thing I did not like about the book was the changing POVs(I and you). I am generally not picky about the POVs, but the intended narrator is hard to determine.
February 28, 2021
This was not a mystery. I read it because it was selected for a mystery book club I belong to. I read it as an Ebook because no library had it and I was not going to buy it. I found it only marginally interesting. Some parts were sexually graphical. I'm not sure it was needed. Its story (stories) were told in alternating chapters by the two main characters. The man was told in the first person, while the woman was told in the second person (you). A little disconcerting, but got used to it. I would not have stayed with it if It was not for my book club reading. Part 2 was better, though only marginally. I rated it 2 stars, but it was more like 1.5 stars, not really into it.
September 21, 2019
Really enjoyed this and would recommend for those interested in East Germany and the effect of IM (the unofficial informers of the Stasi) on society. The effect of people returning to read their own Stasi files and the realisation of the people who betrayed them. Echoes of Anna Funder's Stasiland and Timothy Garton-Ash's The File. Slightly disappointed by the ending, but probably realistic in the circumstances.
October 21, 2019
Ok for a debut novel and I’d certainly be interested to read her next. However, the very promising and interesting plot fell through in too many places, characters were somehow left hanging, and I thought the ending was too predictable and abrupt.
March 29, 2023
Good book but in my opinion focused too much on character than historical and political detail
May 19, 2023
Truth be told, this is not very well written. But the story is captivating and I really enjoyed the Leipzig backdrop, both present day and GDR. Would recommend to Leipzig pals
April 20, 2024
Very good reminder of the horrible way the GDR controlled it's people. I didn't like the chapters written using the second person but otherwise think this is good.
April 27, 2015
I received a copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
I did a one-month study abroad in West Germany in 1985. While we spent most of our time in Nuremburg, we traveled to West Berlin by train and spent a week there. I remember soldiers with machine guns getting onto our train once we crossed into East Germany. When we spent one day in East Berlin, we pretty much stayed on our bus, were taken to various memorial sites commemorating the Soviet liberation of Berlin, and were taken to the Pergamon, at which we were required to change some of our western Marks for instant apple cider and a pastry, to the enrichment of the East Germany monetary system. It was strange to be in a partitioned city, to see the barbed wire on top of the Wall and the kill zone between the eastern and western walls and the soldiers in the eastern towers watching for escapees. No where was the Cold War made more clear to me than in Berlin. I also possessed a little clock and a shawl that my parents told me had been smuggled out of the East, along with their owner.
In this book, the two main characters are an East German student who wants desperately to escape to the West and a young Scottish student who's come over to Leipzig to learn more about a particular German writer- Heinrich Heine, I think? The East German student plans to use the young westerner as cover for her true plans. The book is at its most striking when contrasting the differences in the pair's outlooks. Magda sees in the westerner a man who's never wondered if a friend is an informer, one who's never had to look over his shoulder. He's naive, but she kind of likes him anyway. Part of the book is flashback, after Robert becomes an alcoholic and is relating his time in Leipzig to a young therapist. When he tells her about the partition, about the repression, she's shocked and disbelieving that people could really live that way.
I was in Berlin again last December. There's almost no evidence of partition. There are bricks laid into the street to show where the Wall was, and a bit of it has been moved and put up after international artists worked on it to show their impressions of that time. Sadly, there's already a lot of graffiti over this art. It's just not seen as important, I guess, and people who came of age after the 80's will probably never understand why the Wall was important. Time and politics have moved on, and the world is different now. Germany has reunited, and while there are still pains that come from two separated societies being pushed back together, Germany has remained an economic powerhouse.
So that's what resonated with me with this book- the evocation of a time that's almost impossible for Westerners who have grown up with freedom to move and do as they please to imagine. It's important to remember. The book itself is somewhat loosely structured. The prison system of the East ends up being a setting, and while the aftermath of time in prison is briefly described, it's also glossed over and we don't spend much time with the freed prisoner as they are adjusting. I've read first-hand accounts of eastern bloc prisoners- often the most educated in their countries before the Soviets rolled in- and I suppose those books resonated with me more than this brief fictionalized account. And while obviously this book made me think, I guess I'm not sure what the author's point was, exactly. Maybe that's because my baggage with this is strong enough that I'm not seeing it clearly.
I did a one-month study abroad in West Germany in 1985. While we spent most of our time in Nuremburg, we traveled to West Berlin by train and spent a week there. I remember soldiers with machine guns getting onto our train once we crossed into East Germany. When we spent one day in East Berlin, we pretty much stayed on our bus, were taken to various memorial sites commemorating the Soviet liberation of Berlin, and were taken to the Pergamon, at which we were required to change some of our western Marks for instant apple cider and a pastry, to the enrichment of the East Germany monetary system. It was strange to be in a partitioned city, to see the barbed wire on top of the Wall and the kill zone between the eastern and western walls and the soldiers in the eastern towers watching for escapees. No where was the Cold War made more clear to me than in Berlin. I also possessed a little clock and a shawl that my parents told me had been smuggled out of the East, along with their owner.
In this book, the two main characters are an East German student who wants desperately to escape to the West and a young Scottish student who's come over to Leipzig to learn more about a particular German writer- Heinrich Heine, I think? The East German student plans to use the young westerner as cover for her true plans. The book is at its most striking when contrasting the differences in the pair's outlooks. Magda sees in the westerner a man who's never wondered if a friend is an informer, one who's never had to look over his shoulder. He's naive, but she kind of likes him anyway. Part of the book is flashback, after Robert becomes an alcoholic and is relating his time in Leipzig to a young therapist. When he tells her about the partition, about the repression, she's shocked and disbelieving that people could really live that way.
I was in Berlin again last December. There's almost no evidence of partition. There are bricks laid into the street to show where the Wall was, and a bit of it has been moved and put up after international artists worked on it to show their impressions of that time. Sadly, there's already a lot of graffiti over this art. It's just not seen as important, I guess, and people who came of age after the 80's will probably never understand why the Wall was important. Time and politics have moved on, and the world is different now. Germany has reunited, and while there are still pains that come from two separated societies being pushed back together, Germany has remained an economic powerhouse.
So that's what resonated with me with this book- the evocation of a time that's almost impossible for Westerners who have grown up with freedom to move and do as they please to imagine. It's important to remember. The book itself is somewhat loosely structured. The prison system of the East ends up being a setting, and while the aftermath of time in prison is briefly described, it's also glossed over and we don't spend much time with the freed prisoner as they are adjusting. I've read first-hand accounts of eastern bloc prisoners- often the most educated in their countries before the Soviets rolled in- and I suppose those books resonated with me more than this brief fictionalized account. And while obviously this book made me think, I guess I'm not sure what the author's point was, exactly. Maybe that's because my baggage with this is strong enough that I'm not seeing it clearly.
March 25, 2015
I thoroughly enjoyed this book, the story has twists, turns and many surprises. The main characters of Magda and Robert are very strong, I really like who the author has portaryed them as such a changing time in history. The story starts in East Germany in 1985 and progresses through the time that the Berlin Wall was taken down, it runs through what happened to people who wanted to desert the then DDR and the consequences. I really felt like I was living in the same period of time reading the book. I am lucky enough to have auto approval from the publishers on NetGalley, when I saw this book I jumped at the chance to review it.
August 26, 2015
A fictional, but soundly fact-based look at life behind the Iron Curtain in East Germany during the Cold War. Stasi files show 100,000 East Germans were used to spy on each other, reporting all manner of suspicious activity, and things as mundane having a West German pudding in the pantry! It must have been impossible to trust anyone.
Robert is a Scottish researcher doing research in Leipzig. Magda is a brilliant translator, who is involved with charismatic Marek. A love triangle develops while the spies watch. Does Magda love Robert or is she using him?
A stark look at the difficulty of life in East Germany during the cold war. Recommended.
Robert is a Scottish researcher doing research in Leipzig. Magda is a brilliant translator, who is involved with charismatic Marek. A love triangle develops while the spies watch. Does Magda love Robert or is she using him?
A stark look at the difficulty of life in East Germany during the cold war. Recommended.
August 27, 2015
What a fantastic debut - a very readable page-turner which (from my limited contact with people from Leipzig in the 1980s) does seem to reflect accurately the hopes, fears and experiences of a generation of young people, for whom the demolition of the Berlin Wall offered freedom but not of the kind they had envisioned and worked for, in most cases for many years. It also brings to life the dark side of the East German regime, and how even close friends could turn out to be informers. Indeed, I wonder if any of those young people I met were not what they seemed?
July 21, 2024
In de koude oorlog raakt een Schotsman in Leipzig verzeild in een typische DDR-situatie: wie kun je vertrouwen, wie werkt er voor de Stasi, bedriegen, bedrogen worden en dubbelbedrog. Verhalen over deze tijd zijn altijd fascinerend, en hoewel alle ingrediënten er zijn voor een intrigerend plot, is het slechts heel kort echt spannend. Het afwisselend schrijven vanuit het perspectief van de ene, en dan weer de andere hoofdpersoon, werkt gekunsteld.
Wel interessant waren de verdiepende persoonlijke verhalen na de 'affaire': de alcoholverslaving en het herstellen van een gevangenisperiode.
Wel interessant waren de verdiepende persoonlijke verhalen na de 'affaire': de alcoholverslaving en het herstellen van een gevangenisperiode.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 2, 2015
I got about 25% of the way through this book and still did not understand what was going. Maybe it's my ignorance of European history, etc or the fact that I did not understand most of the words. But I just could not get into this book.
Thank you Aurora Metro Press and Net Galley for the opportunity.
Thank you Aurora Metro Press and Net Galley for the opportunity.
September 10, 2015
I almost quit reading this book after the first fifty pages. I am so glad that I didn't because I would have missed this fine story. It is a human drama that is filled with heart and real to life characters that make you care about their outcome. If you stick with this book you will be rewarded with a very good story filled with heart and hope.
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