Self's Punishment : A Mystery

After his last major case (see SELF'S DECEPTION), German private investigator Gerhard Self is thinking he is too old for this type of work. As he drives home to Manheim with his girlfriend Brigette during a nasty snow storm, Self notices a car in the ditch and stops to assist a stranded driver, banker Bertram Welker. Upon learning that Self is a sleuth, Welker hires the investigator to uncover the identity of a silent bank partner as he is writing the history of the establishment that he co-owns. Self accepts the easy assignment, which pays extraordinarily well. However the detective has self doubts about his client when the bank's archivist mysteriously dies in a car crash just after giving the sleuth an attaché case loaded with money. He digs a bit into his client's past to learn he became a widower last year when his wife died a hiking accident. Two deadly accidents are two to many so Self investigates Welker. This is a super German private investigator mystery with several super twists that will leave readers and the weary hero guessing as nothing is quite like it first seems including a stranger claiming to be the son of Self. The story line is fast-paced but totally owned by the sleuth as his inquiry into the silent partner leads him to inquire about his client. Fans will enjoy the translation of Bernhard Shlink's entertaining German mystery and seek the previous two thrillers (see SELF'S PUNISHMENT). Harriet Klausner

I liked this book - describes a Germany that certainly isn't travelogue pretty, but very interesting. The description of the computer systems was done in a little too much detail - the only reason that I "downgraded" it a star - but I found Self to be an interesting character - although like most detectives in books, sad and lonely. I look forward to reading the other books in the series.

(Kindle Edition) Interesting to see a German take on basic private investigator genre. Decent translation. Plot isn't that much of a puzzle, but it's fun to read something with a very different sense of place and not written for an American audience.

When I first bought this book (under pressure in an airport), I feared it might be rather dry. But a chapter into it, like the previous reviewer, I didn't want the book to end. The mystery itself was pretty routine, which is why I gave the book only four stars, but I loved it for other reasons. It's sparse and unsentimental, and has little description or dialogue, yet somehow I developed a good sense of the characters, and great deal of feeling for some of them. Second, it reveals the side of German culture often overshadowed by Nazi Era images - love of cars, wines, food, music, technology, philosophy - simply by the everyday way in which these things are named or discussed. The people in the book are rather formal and isolated, some are a bit revolting, some are likeable, most are slightly idiosynchratic, and all seem very like people one has met or could meet anywhere. I wanted to keep reading about Self, the cat Turbo, the friend who built edifices with matchsticks while his wife read him stories, and in the closing scene, to be on the balcony on New Year's Eve clinking glasses with Self and his friends. Whether you liked The Reader or not, this book will make you marvel at what a great writer can do with a good character and few words.

This book is a great read. The characters are very full and human. No pale characters here. These are comlpex full-blooded ex-Nazi sexual warm yet lonely human beings. A most enjoyable hard to put down novel which I wanted to read and not have finish. I wished it could have been three or four times longer. Vintage Schlink.