An increasingly tense dual-timeline story split between a young woman in 1920s and 30s Berlin, and her American granddaughter many years later, piecing together this hidden portion of her family's history.
The earlier timeline, following Tillie (Matilda), occurs when Berlin is the gay capital of the world. Homosexual, lesbian, and
trans people are making strides in public acceptability and becoming stage sensations in Berlin's vibrant club scene...only for
the rise of Hitler and his young extremists to push them
underground again with increasing ferocity.
These are the very early years of the National Socialist Party,
when it is plotting strategy in the
homes and offices of respectable lawyers and businessmen, aiming to make
further seat gains fort the next election. Tillie's working in her father's law office when she first becomes aware of the political maneuvering, but at first she's unable to believe it could be a risk to her or anyone she knows. Not even when Ernesto, her best male friend, is spurned by his father, one of her father's main clients, over his homosexuality. But it begins to hit harder for Tillie's lover, Ruth, who is not only a cross-dressing nightclub entertainer and a lesbian; she's also Jewish.
In the modern timeline, the young Tillie is a
grandmother now suffering from increasing dementia, which we see through
the eyes of her granddaughter Thea, who is uncovering the old woman’s past even as
the owner is losing it. The names of the two women, Tilly and Thea, take a bit of getting
used to of separating mentally.
As is often the case with dual timeline books, the modern narrative is less compelling than the one set in the past. We learn little about Thea except that she is poking around
in her grandmother‘s stuff, trying to find out what the reader already
knows from the past timeline. The author readily conveys Thea's struggle to accommodate her grandmother's increasing dementia while coming to terms with the void underlying the official family history she thought she knew.
Give My Love to Berlin is an Aimée & Jaguar tale for the current generation, but where the book by Austrian author Erica Fischer was based on a true story, Tillie and Ruth's doomed love story is fiction. Tillie is the daughter of a mid-level Party official, where the very real Lilly Wust was the wife of a high-ranking one. The resonances to struggles that current 20-somethings in the LGBTQ+ community face in many countries, both in the 1990s when the book came out and now, in the 2120s when Russia, much of the USA, and parts of Canada are actively dangerous for openly queer people once again.
We have recent history to reflect on as well. France narrowly escaped rule by a far-right party through arcane constitutional shenanigans. Australia booted its harder-right government. Yet Germany’s AfD party has seat
gains in their recent election, not quite 100 years after the events of this book.
It is very creepy sitting in Canada after a hotly contested
federal election fueled by propaganda
against the governing party and individual politicians, where homophobic slurs have become once more common currency. There are small local/regional newsheets and pamphlets in blue-collar coffee shops that sound very much like those the Germans were using in the 1920s to turn citizens
against at foreigners, immigrants, undesirables like trans and queer
individuals and groups. There is less overt bias in mainstream media ,
except by their decision not to call out certain politicians or push
back against certain statements or public actions to avoid backlash by
(mostly) online thugs. And of course social media is a sewer filled
with hate speech and more subtle disinformation pushed by bot farms and paid for by right-wing dark money, both home-generated and flowing in from the same US tech bro class that is currently looting and pillaging the government of that country. Are Canadians wise enough to see where this hate-fomenting trend could go and push back harder against the conservatives‘ more extreme base, both federally and provincially?
Ultimately, a good novel entertains you - takes you to a different time and space, into another person's story - even while it pushes you to reflect on your own world and time. This novel gives much food for thought.
Ultimately, a good novel entertains you - takes you to a different time and space, into another person's story - even while it pushes you to reflect on your own world and time. This novel gives much food for thought.
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