Melville House Publishing | Every Man Dies Alone

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Every Man Dies Alone

Hans Fallada

"A signal literary event of 2009." -- The New York Times Book Review

**A New York Times Notable Book of 2009
**A San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of 2009
**One of the New Yorker’s Favorite Fiction Books of 2009
**One of The New Republic's Top 5 Fiction Books of 2009
**One of the Washington City Paper's Top 10 Books of 2009
**One of the Toronto Globe & Mail’s Best Books of 2009
**One of the Barnes & Noble Review’s Top 10 Fiction Books of 2009
**One of the Scotsman's Best Fiction Books of 2009
**A Sunday Telegraph Best Book of 2009

This never-before-translated masterpiece—by a heroic best-selling writer who saw his life crumble under the Nazis—is based on a true story.

It presents a richly detailed portrait of life in Berlin under the Nazis and tells the sweeping saga of one working-class couple who decides to take a stand when their only son is killed at the front. With nothing but their grief and each other against the awesome power of the Reich, they launch a simple, clandestine resistance campaign that soon has an enraged Gestapo on their trail, and a world of terrified neighbors and cynical snitches ready to turn them in.

In the end, it's more than an edge-of-your-seat thriller, more than a moving romance, even more than literature of the highest order—it's a deeply stirring story of two people standing up for what's right, and each other.

PRESS AND REVIEWS

A New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice

“A signal literary event of 2009 has occurred… Rescued from the grave, from decades of forgetting…[Every Man Dies Alone] testifies to the lasting value of an intact, if battered, conscience…In a publishing hat trick, Melville House allows English-language readers to sample Fallada’s vertiginous variety…[and] the keen vision of a troubled man in troubled times, with more breadth, detail and understanding…than most other chroniclers of the era have delivered. To read Every Man Dies Alone, Fallada’s testament to the darkest years of the 20th century, is to be accompanied by a wise, somber ghost who grips your shoulder and whispers in your ear: “This is how it was. This is what happened.”

—New York Time Book Review Link

"The greatest book ever written about German resistance to the Nazis."

—Primo Levi

"Hans Fallada's Every Man Dies Alone is one of the most extraordinary and compelling novels ever written about World War II. Fallada lived through the Nazi hell so every word rings true—this is who they really were: the Gestapo monsters, the petty informers, the few who dared to resist. Please do not miss this."

—Alan Furst, author of The Spies of Warsaw

"The next Némirovsky...?"

—Publishers Weekly Link PDF

"[A] grim, powerful, epic portrait of life in Germnay under Nazi rule. Fallada keeps readers engaged with passionate prose that rushes events along at a thriller-like pace…A welcome resurrection for a great writer crucified by history."

—Kirkus

“Every Man Dies Alone…deserves a place among the 20th century’s best novels of political witness.”

—Sam Munson, The National Link

"Every Man Dies Alone [is] a suspense-driven novel… one-of-a-kind."

—Alan Furst, Toronto Globe and Mail Link

“[O]ne of the most extraordinarily ambitious literary resurrections in recent memory [for a writer who] had a poet’s heart and a dramatist’s ear.”

—Los Angeles Times Link

"Every Man Dies Alone [is] one of the most immediate and authentic fictional accounts of life during the long nightmare of Nazi rule."

—The New York Observer Link

"[An] unblinking, brilliant report from a living Hell…compulsively readable."

—Shelf Awareness

"[A] masterpiece."

—Nextbook Link

"Primo Levi…called this "the greatest book ever written about the German resistance to the Nazis." It is, in retrospect, an understatement. This is a novel that is so powerful, so intense, that it almost hums with electricity."

—Minneapolis Star-Tribune Link

" [Every Man Dies Alone] has the suspense of a John le Carré novel, and offers a visceral, chilling portrait of the distrust that permeated everyday German life during the war."

—The New Yorker Link

"[A]t once a riveting page turner and a memorable portrait of wartime Berlin...With its vivid cast of characters and pervasive sense of menace, Every Man Dies Alone is an exciting book."

—John Powers for Fresh Air / NPR Books We Like Link

Top "Summer Read" pick, '09

—On Point Raido, WBUR Link

"...a belated revelation."

—San Francisco Chronicle Link

"...necessary and gripping."

—The Oregonian Link

"...essential, thrilling...."

—Carlo Wolff, St. Petersburgh Times Link

"Unique in its insight into life in Nazi Germany."

—Listen to NPR's Alan Cheuse discuss Every Man Dies Alone with Rick Kleffel on The Agony's podcast Link

"A publication of enormous importance."

—Washington Times Link

"Showcases Fallada's talent for fluid storytelling."

—The Nation Link

"An amazing book."

—Lev Raphael, WKAR review Link

"Though Every Man Dies Alone is a unique publishing event for many reasons, the book is also a literary triumph. This art does not merely imitate life. It screams at us, over time, space and culture: ‘I was there.’"

—Montreal Gazette Link

"An unforgettable portrait of a middle-aged couple’s campaign of civil disobedience against the Nazis."

—Vogue Link

"The first English translation, lovingly prepared by Melville House, deserves celebration for its historical insight, its literary beauty and its rare sense of humanity."

—LA Weekly Link

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Before WWII, German writer Hans Fallada's novels were international bestsellers, on a par with those of his countrymen Thoman Mann and Herman Hesse. In America, Hollywood even turned his first big novel, Little Man, What Now? into a major motion picture

Learning the movie was made by a Jewish producer, however, the Nazis blocked Fallada's work from foreign rights sales, and began to pay him closer attention. When he refused to join the Nazi party he was arrested by the Gestapo—who eventually released him, but thereafter regularly summoned him for "discussions" of his work.

However, unlike Mann, Hesse, and others, Fallada refused to flee to safety, even when his British publisher, George Putnam, sent a private boat to rescue him. The pressure took its toll on Fallada, and he resorted increasingly to drugs and alcohol for relief. Not long after Goebbels ordered him to write an anti-Semitic novel he snapped and found himself imprisoned in an asylum for the "criminally insane"—considered a death sentence under Nazi rule. To forestall the inevitable, he pretended to write the assignment for Goebbels, while actually composing three encrypted books—including his tour de force novel The Drinker—in such dense code that they were not deciphered until long after his death.

Fallada outlasted the Reich and was freed at war's end. But he was a shattered man. To help him recover by putting him to work, Fallada's publisher gave him the Gestapo file of a simple, working-class couple who had resisted the Nazis. Inspired, Fallada completed Every Man Dies Alone in just twenty-four days.

He died in February 1947, just weeks before the book's publication.