Tim Mohr

“A thrilling and essential social history that details the rebellious youth movement that helped change the world.” —Rolling Stone “Original and inspiring . . . Mr. Mohr has writ­ten an im­por­tant work of Cold War cul­tural his­tory.” —The Wall Street Journal “Wildly entertaining . . . A thrilling tale . . . A joy in the way it brings back punk’s fury and high stakes.”—Vogue It began with a handful of East Berlin teens who heard the Sex Pistols on a British military radio broadcast to troops in West Berlin, and it ended with the collapse of the East German dictatorship. Punk rock was a life-changing discovery. The buzz-saw guitars, the messed-up clothing and hair, the rejection of society and the DIY approach to building a new one: in their gray surroundings, where everyone’s future was preordained by some communist apparatchik, punk represented a revolutionary philosophy—quite literally, as it turned out. But as these young kids tried to form bands and became more visible, security forces—including the dreaded secret police, the Stasi—targeted them. They were spied on by friends and even members of their own families; they were expelled from schools and fired from jobs; they were beaten by police and imprisoned. Instead of conforming, the punks fought back, playing an indispensable role in the underground movements that helped bring down the Berlin Wall. This secret history of East German punk rock is not just about the music; it is a story of extraordinary bravery in the face of one of the most oppressive regimes in history. Rollicking, cinematic, deeply researched, highly readable, and thrillingly topical, Burning Down the Haus brings to life the young men and women who successfully fought authoritarianism three chords at a time—and is a fiery testament to the irrepressible spirit of revolution.

Punk Rock, Revolution, and the Fall of the Berlin Wall

Burning Down the Haus

Charlotte Roche

Helen Memel, an outspoken eighteen-year-old with a childlike stubbornness and a precocious sexual confidence, starts scheming on reuniting her divorced parents.

Wetlands

Stefanie De Velasco

We need to practise for later on, for real life. We need to know everything so nobody can ever mess with us.' Nini and Jameelah are best friends forever. This summer they're going to grow up. Together. On their terms. But things don't always turn out the way you plan... Tender, funny, shocking and tragic, TIGER MILK captures what it is to be young.

Tiger Milk

Alina Bronsky

A Novel

Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine

The sensational new novel from Charlotte Roche, author of Wetlands In her controversial first novel, Wetlands, which The New York Times called "a cri de coeur against the oppression of a waxed, shaved, douched and otherwise sanitized women's world," Roche wrote about sex and the female body in an unprecedentedly frank way. Roche's second novel, Wrecked, is just as raw and powerful as her debut but is a more mature work that deals with sex, death, fidelity and the question of what is expected from a 21st-century wife and mother. It's easier to give a blow job than to make coffee. That's what Elizabeth Kiehl, mother of seven-year-old Liza, thinks to herself after a particularly lengthy and inventive bout of sex with her husband Georg--recounted in detail over the book's first sixteen pages. Elizabeth makes great efforts to pleasure her husband in the bedroom and is also an extremely thoughtful and caring mother to her daughter. But her perfect mother and wife act hides a painful past and a tragic rift in her psyche. As a result, Elizabeth's relationship with Georg is rather unusual: most husbands and wives wouldn't watch porn together or go off on joint trips to a local brothel for threesomes with prostitutes while their daughter is at school. But is their relationship unhealthy or just a very modern marriage?

Tim Mohr

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