Every Man Dies Alone

A New York Times Book Review “Notable Book of The Year” 2009 The New Yorker’s Favorite Fiction Books of 2009 A Globe & Mail Best Books of the Year selection 2009 Barnes & Noble Review’s Top Ten Fiction Books of 2009 Amazon Top Ten Novels of the Year So Far NPR’s On Point Radio Top Ten Summer Reads The San Francisco Chronicle Best Books of the Year Minneapolis Star Tribune Top Books of the Year The New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice The New Republic’s Top 5 Fiction Books of 2009 Washington City Paper’s Top 10 Books of 2009 The Scotsman Best Fiction Books of 2009 The Sunday Telegraph Best Books of 2009 Best Books of the Year, Shelf Awareness “I think often about the ending of that novel–a dark one–and about a particular, oddly hopeful, line that expresses a profound truth about our humanness.” - Claire Messud, Elle Magazine “The greatest book ever written about German resistance to the Nazis.”- Primo Levi “A wonderful novel…Compelling.” – Ian McEwan “Hans Fallada’s Every Man Dies Alone is one of the most extraordinary and compelling novels ever written about World War II. Ever. 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 “An unrivaled and vivid portrait of life in wartime Berlin.” - Philip Kerr “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 vetiginous 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 arm and whispers in your ear: ‘This is how it was. This is what happened.’”- New York Times Book Review “One of the most extraordinarily ambitious literary resurrections in recent memory.” – The Los Angeles Time “A riveting page turner.” – NPR’s Fresh Air “An unforgettable portrait of a middle-aged couple’s campaign of civil disobedience against the Nazis.” – Vogue “A publication of enormous importance.” – Washington Times “Fallada’s prose is rough and ready … it grabs you by the throat.” – Boston Phoenix “It is no wonder that the work’s reception in the English-speaking world has been the journalistic equivalent of a collective dropped jaw.” - The Montreal Gazette “Every Man Dies Alone…deserves a place among the 20th century’s best novels of political witness.”-Sam Munson, The National “Every Man Dies Alone [is] a suspense-driven novel…one-of-a-kind.”–Alan Furst, Toronto Globe and Mail “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 “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 “[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 “[At] 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 “…a belated revelation.“—San Francisco Chronicle “…necessary and gripping.“—The Oregonian “A classic … as morally powerful as anything I’ve ever read.” – The Daily Telegraph (London) “Essential, thrilling.” – The St. Petersburg Times “His masterpiece.” - Nextbook “This novel is far more than literary thriller.” – The Financial Times “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 “An amazing book … it’s not a novel just of ideas, it’s a novel that is a page turner … you just can’t let go… just amazing.” - WKAR/NPR “…paved with terrific suspense, lively vignettes of Berlin life, and some very funny episodes…infusing it with a brilliant bleak irony and terrible power.” – The Barnes & Nobel Review “[An] unblinking, brilliant report from a living Hell…Fans of the novels of Alan Furst and Irene Nemirovsky will love the gritty “you are there” feel of this harrowing saga of a German couple fighting for their dignity in the face of unrelenting Nazi oppression and sadism.” – Shelf Awareness “It is a harrowing book. I recommend it.” - America Magazine

Hans Fallada was a German writer whose novels were international bestsellers prior to WWII, comparable to those of Thomas Mann and Herman Hesse. His novel, Little Man, What Now? was adapted into a major motion picture in Hollywood.

After learning the film was produced by a Jewish producer, Hitler banned Fallada’s work from being sold outside Germany, and the Nazis began to monitor him closely. Despite pressure to join the Nazi party, he refused and was arrested by the Gestapo, who later released him but regularly summoned him for questioning.

Unlike Mann and Hesse, Fallada declined to flee to safety, even when offered rescue. The pressure led him to rely on drugs and alcohol. When ordered by Goebbels to write an anti-Semitic novel, he was imprisoned in an asylum for the “criminally insane.” To avoid the likely death sentence, he pretended to write the assignment while secretly composing three encrypted books, including The Drinker.

Fallada was freed after the war but was a broken man. He was commissioned to write about a working-class couple who resisted the Nazis, resulting in Every Man Dies Alone, completed in just twenty-four days. He died in February 1947, shortly before the book’s publication.