Ben Fergusson

"For eighteen-year-old Ralf living in West Berlin, the summer of 1989 opens up a whole new world. He and his three best friends have finished school for ever and are living in a golden few months before the next stage of their adult life begins. But the old tensions of East and West come closer to home when Ralf makes some unsettling discoveries about his mother, alongside confronting his own sexuality. Forced to make choices about which side he is on, Ralf becomes caught up in a web of lies, deceit and confusion. Who can he really trust?"--Provided by publisher.

An Honest Man

Daniel Schreiber

Reflections on Solitary Living

Alone

In 2018, after the introduction of marriage equality in Germany, Ben Fergusson and his German husband Tom became one of the first same-sex married couples to adopt in the country. In Tales from the Fatherland Fergusson reflects on his long journey to fatherhood and the social changes that enabled it. He uses his outsider status as both a gay father and a parent adopting in a foreign country to explore the history and sociology of fatherhood and motherhood around the world, queer parenting and adoption and, ultimately, the meaning of family and love.

Tales from the Fatherland makes an impassioned case for the value of diversity in family life, arguing that diverse families are good for all families and that misogyny lies at the heart of many of the struggles of straight and queer families alike.

Two Dads, One Adoption and the Meaning of Parenthood

Tales from the Fatherland

Shortlisted for the Sunday Times/Peters Fraser & Dunlop Young Writer of the Year Award 2015 Winner of the Betty Trask Prize 2015 Winner of the Historical Writers' Association 2015 Debut Crown Award Berlin, 1946. Everything is in short supply. Including the truth. The war is over, but Berlin is a desolate sea of rubble. There is a shortage of everything: food, clothing, tobacco. The local population is scrabbling to get by. Kasper Meier is one of these Germans, and his solution is to trade on the black market to feed himself and his elderly father. He can find anything that people need, for the right price. Even other people. When a young woman, Eva, arrives at Kasper's door seeking the whereabouts of a British pilot, he feels a reluctant sympathy for her but won't interfere in military affairs. But Eva is prepared for this. Kasper has secrets, she knows them, and she'll use them to get what she wants. As the threats against him mount, Kasper is drawn into a world of intrigue he could never have anticipated. Why is Eva so insistent that he find the pilot? Who is the shadowy Frau Beckmann and what is her hold over Eva? Under constant surveillance, Kasper navigates the dangerous streets and secrets of a city still reeling from the horrors of war and defeat. As a net of deceit, lies and betrayal falls around him, Kasper begins to understand that the seemingly random killings of members of the occupying forces are connected to his own situation. He must work out who is behind Eva's demands, and why - while at the same time trying to save himself, his father and Eva.

The Spring of Kasper Meier

A pause. 'Ah, Herr Fergusson. It's Frau Schwenk.' Our social worker, I now understood. 'Thank you for getting back to me. I'm calling because we have a little boy, four weeks old, who needs a family.' In 2018, after the introduction of marriage equality in Germany, Ben Fergusson and his German husband Tom became one of the first same-sex married couples to adopt in the country. In Tales from the Fatherland Fergusson reflects on his long journey to fatherhood and the social changes that enabled it. He uses his outsider status as both a gay father and a parent adopting in a foreign country to explore the history and sociology of fatherhood and motherhood around the world, queer parenting and adoption and, ultimately, the meaning of family and love. Tales from the Fatherland makes an impassioned case for the value of diversity in family life, arguing that diverse families are good for all families and that misogyny lies at the heart of many of the struggles of straight and queer families alike.

Other Hoffmann Sister

Shortlisted for The Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year 2015, Ben Fergusson's critically acclaimed debut, The Spring of Kasper Meier, was the winner of the Betty Trask Prize 2015 and the HWA 2015 Debut Crown Award. The Other Hoffmann Sister is a gripping, evocative read about two sisters set in pre-WW1 Germany which will appeal to fans of The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry. For Ingrid Hoffmann the story of her sister's disappearance began in their first weeks in Southwest Africa... Ingrid Hoffmann has always felt responsible for her sister Margarete and when their family moves to German Southwest Africa in 1902, her anxieties only increase. The casual racism that pervades the German community, the strange relationship between her parents and Baron von Ketz, from whom they bought their land, and the tension with the local tribes all culminate in tragedy when Baron von Ketz is savagely murdered. Baroness von Ketz and their son, Emil, flee with the Hoffmanns as the Baron's attackers burn down the family's farm. Both families return to Berlin and Ingrid's concerns about Margarete are assuaged when she and Emil von Ketz become engaged on the eve of the First World War. But Margarete disappears on her wedding night at the von Ketz's country house. The mystery of what happened to her sister haunts Ingrid, but as Europe descends into chaos, her hope of discovering the truth becomes ever more distant. After the war, in the midst of the revolution that brings down the Kaiser and wipes out the aristocracy that her family married into, Ingrid returns to the von Ketzes' crumbling estate determined to find out what really happened to her sister.

The Other Hoffmann Sister

IJzingwekkende thriller over de verwoestingen van de Tweede Wereldoorlog Tussen de ruïnes van het door de oorlog verwoeste Berlijn is Kasper Meiers grootste zorg overleven. Door te ruilen en te handelen op de zwarte markt probeert hij genoeg eten voor zichzelf en zijn oude vader bij elkaar te sprokkelen. Dan staat Eva opeens voor zijn deur. Ze vraagt om hulp bij de zoektocht naar een Britse soldaat die haar vriendin zwanger zou hebben gemaakt. Als Kasper zijn medewerking weigert, dreigt Eva al zijn geheimen te onthullen en sleurt ze hem mee in een sinistere klopjacht op de Britse soldaten. Ben Fergusson is schrijver, redacteur en vertaler. Zijn korte verhaal Berlijn stond op de shortlist van de Bridport Prize en hij werd door Sarah Waters geprezen om zijn 'prachtige en nauwkeurige proza'. Ben Fergusson woont in Londen, maar schreef zijn debuut De lente van Kasper Meier in Berlijn, waar hij vier jaar woonde en werkte.

De lente van Kasper Meier

'He had seen the British soldiers arrive and lead them out through the courtyard: cheats, prostitutes, liars, war criminals, but mostly people like him - half-starved blackmarketeers lying about who they shared their rooms with.' Kasper Meier lives in Berlin - the city and its people broken by war. He scrabbles to get by, finding things that people need: cigarettes, information, other people. A stranger approaches Kasper in a makeshift cafe, seeking the whereabouts of a painting by Gustav Klimt. Kasper is out of his depth, but the promise of goods and the man's menacing threats leave him with no choice but to track it down. The search leads him to Frau Roland and Berlin-Tempelhof, where she spends hours watching the aeroplanes arriving and departing. What is she waiting for? Where is the painting? And is Kasper's life in danger? In this intriguing and compelling short story, Ben Fergusson introduces us to the world of post-war Berlin and provides a taste of his extraordinary debut novel, The Spring of Kasper Meier, which is published in hardback and ebook in July 2014.

Ben Fergusson

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