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Rebecca Cantrell | Like a First Love, Berlin Never Lets You Go...
May 13, 2009
“Life is a cabaret, old chum, come to the cabaret!” sings Sally Bowles in Cabaret , the movie musical set in 1931 Berlin. Who wouldn’t want to hear the singers? Watch the scantily clad dancers? Try to
guess who was a woman and who was just dressed like one? Taste illegal absinthe? So I went. My novel, A TRACE
OF SMOKE, is set in the world of 1931 Berlin. It’s where cabaret nightingale
Ernst Vogel, the murder victim, flitted from one dangerous man to the next. Researching the novel was intriguing. I tasted absinthe in a modern speakeasy in
San Francisco, toured the real-life gay bar where my fictional character sang 70
years ago, and learned that all giant rubies have a name. And I got to watch
tons of black and white films and call it work: M<
img
src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=freshfiction-20&l=as2&o=1&a=B00065GX64"
width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="" style="border:none !important; margin:0px
!important;" /> with Peter Lorre, The
Blue Angel with Marlene Dietrich, Emil and the Detectives directed
by Billy Wilder. Plus I snuck in another viewing of Casablanca
and The
Third Man even though they were not filmed in Berlin or set in 1931. I’ve been entranced with Berlin since I lived there in the 1980s, before the
Wall came down. I fell in love with Berlin: the sights, sounds, tastes, and
historical burden. I was among the flirting teenagers, guest workers, draft
dodgers, artists, and GIs who danced to Starship’s “We Built this City” in the
Kuh-Dorf disco. More people packed into that disco every night than lived in my
Alaskan home town of Talkeetna. Like any first love, Berlin never let go of me. Years later I called up the
cabarets, the coal, and the cobblestones to create a world for Hannah Vogel to
inhabit. Now I can go back any time I want. And so can you. Rebecca Cantrell
www.RebeccaCantrell.com
Comments
13 comments posted.
Re: Rebecca Cantrell | Like a First Love, Berlin Never Lets You Go...
I hear that modern Berliners are in love with their city, too. I can't wait to meet Hannah Vogler! When should I expect to find A TRACE OF SMOKE in Borders or Barnes and Noble.
(Judith Heath 2:05am May 7, 2009)
A TRACE OF SMOKE should be at your local bookstores, including Borders and Barnes & Noble as of yesterday. It should be on the New Arrivals or New Mystery tables.
Berlin today is every bit as fascinating as it was in the 1930s. More actually, as it's much more stable politically. :)
(Rebecca Cantrell 3:51am May 13, 2009)
I hope A TRACE OF SMOKE will give me some understanding of what was happening in Germany in the 1930's. I can't fathom what made it ripe for a despot like Hitler.
(Judith Heath 5:53am May 13, 2009)
Talkeetna is about as different from Berlin as you can get. I have been to both and prefer Talkeetna - of course, I didn't have to live in either city so I am speaking as a visitor. And I would like to visit the Berlin of the 1930s.
(Karin Tillotson 11:20am May 13, 2009)
'A Trace of Smoke' makes the past come alive. We can learn so much from history that can be applied to today.
(Rosemary Krejsa 6:18pm May 13, 2009)
Judy: A Trace of Smoke is a slice of life for one woman living through terrible historic times. I hope it captures that one experience. I think it could have gone either way for Germany in 1931. Hitler's rise to power was not as inevitable as it seems now.
Karin: Talkeetna is lovely, isn't it? The view of Mt. McKinley is amazing. But as a teenager, Berlin had a lot more going on...
Rosemary: Thank you!
(Rebecca Cantrell 7:08pm May 13, 2009)
What a wonderful idea for a book! I'd love to read your story.
(LuAnn Morgan 8:50pm May 13, 2009)
Sounds like an interesting look at a
pivotal time in German history. We miss
so many threads that come together to
make the history we see.
(Patricia Barraclough 10:38pm May 13, 2009)
Berlin sounds so mysterious, probably because it's across the water in Europe. I remember listening to a chanteuse singing sultry tunes in a bank converted into a nightclub. Boy, could she hit the notes.
(Alyson Widen 11:27pm May 13, 2009)
I want to travel so bad. At least I get a
glimpse of traveling when I read.
(Bridget Hopper 5:29pm May 14, 2009)
Sounds like a good one! I just finished another book about postwar berlin - pre WWII and it was fascinating...
(Mari M. 4:43pm May 15, 2009)
Fascinating. I would love to read your books.
(Patsy Hagen 1:45pm May 19, 2009)
I'm so pleased that some writers are actually beginning to set their stories in Germany. I've been reading for close to 60 years, and the only books set there were ones written by Germans in German. Few of them have ever been translated. Now within less than a month, I have become ware of 2 novels set there: Renee Ryan's Love Inspired Historical, Dangerous Allies and your today your Hannah Vogel book. I've often wanted to be able to view my parents' world from a novel's perspective--both grew up in Berlin--and this will be a great chance. For most writers it seems to be impossible to see beyond the Hitler era to see what Germans were like before that and are today. It has often bothered me. There have long been novels set in Japan and other formerly combatant nations like Italy, but not Germany. My family and I emigrated to Canada almost 60 years ago. But we had a lot of roots in Germany.
I'll definitely be looking for your books.
(Sigrun Schulz 6:53pm October 15, 2010)
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