This was a random purchase while I was out spending my "birthday money" as I fancied some fiction. So many books in my To Do Pile are factual... It is set ( at start) in 1966 Vienna ( my birthday year) as I thought I'd give it a whirl.
I really enjoyed it, it reminded me in style of a couple of other books, but it was also very unique..
Straight to Charlotte Brontë "Shirley" where war, and industrial revolution, we could almost be right now "misery generates hate".
It's a big book, but I'm reading it fairly fast!
That interests me in part because I lived in Vienna for a little while.
I was there 1989-1990.
It was an exciting time to be in that part of Europe; I can still remember the distinctive smell of Trabis as people from the GDR poured into Austria after Hungary opened their borders.
My favourite coffee house was Café Sperl: https://www.cafesperl.at/en_home.html
There is so much to see, hear, and fall in love with in Vienna. I also felt the that the city was haunted by the loss of the Jewish intelligentsia.
Recommended reading: The World of Yesterday -- Stefan Zweig
https://www.lbi.org/test/The-World-of-Yesterday/
You can reflect on all this as you travel round the city on one of the world's best public transport systems.
Do go there if you can!
Dope Old Person
Jonathan Emmesedi