Giveaway Winner: Heidegger's Glasses

Thank you to everyone who entered the giveaway for Heidegger's Glasses. The winner has been selected:

Congratulations Elizabeth!

If you didn't win, you can still pick up the book with free shipping world at the Book Depository.

Heidegger's Glasses Giveaway

Earlier this week I posted my review of the historical fiction novel Heidegger's Glasses by Thaisa Frank. You can read it here. Now thanks to the publisher I have the awesome opportunity to give someone else a free copy. The summary of the book from Goodreads is:

Heidegger’s Glasses opens during the end of World War II in a failing Germany coming apart at its seams. The Third Reich’s strong reliance on the occult and its obsession with the astral plane has led to the formation of an underground compound of scribes –translators responsible for answering letters written to those eventually killed in the concentration camps.

Into this covert compound comes a letter written by eminent philosopher Martin Heidegger to his optometrist, a man now lost in the dying thralls of Auschwitz. How will the scribes answer this letter? The presence of Heidegger’s words--one simple letter in a place filled with letters--sparks a series of events that will ultimately threaten the safety and well-being of the entire compound.

Part love story, part thriller, part meditation on how the dead are remembered and history is presented, with threads of Heidegger’s philosophy woven throughout, the novel evocatively illustrates the Holocaust through an almost dreamlike state. Thaisa Frank deftly reconstructs the landscape of Nazi Germany from an entirely original vantage point. 

In order to enter to win a copy of Heidegger's Glasses there are three things you can do:

1) Leave a comment letting me know what your favourite time period to read about is
2) Subscribe to In The Next Room by Google Friend Connect
3) Spread the word of this giveaway on your own blog and leave a link for me to check

Please leave a separate comment for each entry as well as your e-mail address so I can contact you if you win. The contest will run until December 19th at midnight MST. You will have 48 hours to respond to my e-mail and claim your prize. Unfortunately this giveaway is limited to Canada/US only, no PO boxes.

CONTEST CLOSED- congrats Elizabeth!

Heidegger's Glasses by Thaisa Frank

"Sometimes he liked to imagine that each star was a word, and the sky was a piece of paper. Then the stars unfurled into a phrase- a proclamation for just one night."

Heidegger's Glasses by Thaisa Frank takes place during World War II, as a group of Jews live underground in a converted mine, called the compound, as scribes, translating and answering letters written to the dead. These Jews were saved because of their knowledge of multiple languages, and as a result of the Third Reich's reliance on occult, they are responsible for ensuring that the dead get their replies. They also help perpetuate the impression that people aren't actually dying at concentration camps. However when the philosopher Martin Heidegger writes a letter to his optometrist, a man now dying at Auschwitz, who is able to reply? The answer to this question results in a series of events which will change the course of history for those who live at the compound.

This book fell somewhere in the middle ground for me- I admired the research and details that went into the story, as well Frank's technically expert writing. I especially appreciated the fact that Heidegger's Glasses is a book, which despite being on a very popular topic, takes a look at a less known perspective of World War II, including a Nazi who tries to help Jews and wishes for Germany's defeat and Jews who escaped concentration camps. However, I did find the story itself slightly distant, at times I almost felt as if I was reading a script, and while I certainly feel it could make a fantastic film I didn't quite get the emotional connection to the characters that I craved.

In addition, without providing any spoilers, I found the abrupt time change at the end of the novel as well as the switch to a brand-new character slightly awkward and out of place. While the ending of Heidegger's Glasses did feel rushed, there were many beautiful scenes which I loved, the contemplations on the idea of always feeling near-death after an experience like being in a concentration camp, and how such a shocking horror divides the lives of the people who experience it into Before and After. There were some characters I wished to get to know better (like Maria, a woman who spends months living under the floor in hiding) and others I didn't care so much for including half a dozen romantic liasons happening in the compound between people I could never quite keep straight.

At the beginning of each chapter Frank includes an actual letter from the period as well as the translation. The letters themselves are simple but heartbreaking since the reader realizes what likely happened to the person who wrote them. Overall, Heidegger's Glasses is an intelligent book, it just didn't quite capture my heart. ***

A Note: One of the biggest questions I was left with upon finishing Heidegger's Glasses was what is fact and what is fiction. That is a testament to how well Frank blends the two, but I am definitely still curious. Frank has done a guest post answering this question which I found very interesting and really recommend. It is available here. For those wondering- individuals at concentration camps were forced to write letters on their virtues, but those letters were not actually answered as they are in the book.

Number of Pages: 336 pages
Published: May 2010
Source: 

This review was a part of TLC Book Tours. Click here to read what other tour hosts thought. For the purpose of this review I was provided with a copy of the book which did not require a positive review. The opinions expressed in this post are completely my own.