Author: Philip Kerr

Publisher: Quercus

First published: 2010

Setting: Cuba, New York, Germany, Minsk, France, Russia
Read in January 2014

My Rating ★★★  3.4

My Waterstones Review

“Some Bernie Gunther fans may be disappointed”

I’m a Bernie Gunther fan and this was my 7th Philip Kerr novel, but where I have loved all the others, particularly the first three collected together as Berlin Noir, I was left disappointed with Field Grey. It starts and finishes well but it has a long middle.

This is not a linearly written book, it is set in 1954 but the weak plot reminisces the history between Bernie and Erich Mielke who ends up being high up in the Stasi, the East German secret police. But not only do we bounce around time but we also bounce from location to location. The descriptions of various camps and prisons seems brutally real, but what I love about Bernie is his sardonic nature and his detective skills, both were depressed in this selective story of Bernie’s life, mostly as a prisoner.

Some of Field Grey’s characters and events are real and there is a useful few pages of Author’s Notes which I wish I had read first.

Book Review

Field Grey is set in 1954, starts in Cuba, ends in Berlin, in between Bernie Gunther, our ex-detective, will go via New York, Germany, France and back to Germany, most often traveling from prison to prison. The book is not written linearly and under interrogation Bernie reminisces events from 1941, 1931, 1940, 1945, and 1946 and in various locations; Minsk (Belarus), Germany, France and Russia. If you have gathered the gist, with 21 time and location changes across 40 chapters this is not the easiest book to follow, but at least Philip must have recognized this as a problem because each chapter heading repositions us by location and time. Just keep reminding yourself that time now is 1954 and when it isn’t then we are time traveling.

This is my 7th Bernie Gunther story, Berlin Noir counting as three of these, I am a great fan, but Field Grey was disappointing. It is the 7th in the series of 9, the last was – A Man Without Breath (2013). I am treating Field Grey as a bit of a blip as I loved Prague Fatale which was published one year later in 2011. Then again it might just be me, the 1500+ goodread reviewers rated it at an average of 4.03. Goodread reviews of Philip Kerr books

Field Grey has a great start and end, but at 567 pages it is the middle which starts to drag. It is the lack of plot which drove my rating. The reminisces follow the history between Bernie and Erich Mielke who in 1954 is not quite the top dog in the East German Ministry of State Security, the Stasi. Erich Mielke was actually a real person, the head of the secret police for 32 years from 1957. In 1993 after German reunification Erich Mielke was convicted of the murders of two police officers Paul Anlauf and Franz Lenck in 1931 which is when Erich and Bernie first met in Field Grey, but in Chapter 12.