Finished reading: The Passenger by Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz 📚

Five stars. Searing, paranoia-inducing, frustrating and empathetic. It hits the ground running and doesn’t let up even to the final page. The final manuscript with author revisions was lost at sea; the rough edges makes this edited but unfinished work all the more real, in my eyes.

I invite, no, implore everyone to read this. It’s more than a good thriller. It conveys the experience of a Jew in Nazi Germany in ways no movie or factual account can. If you’re like me, someone who would have been an Aryan instead of a Jew, you’ll read Silbermann’s experiences with other Germans and see pieces of yourself or who you could become. You’ll also read Silbermann’s reactions to those Germans, and maybe have some sympathy for people who today are in his position.

It isn’t hard to read metaphors linking any marginalized group into Silbermann’s race across Germany, particularly LGBTQ+ groups in America today. As carefully delicately as such analogies must be made, it makes this book all the more relevant for today.