BOOKS FROM GERMANYThe Artificial Silk Girl
by Irmgard Keun
Tags:
Set in Germany
Female author
Description:
This is a hilarious, tragic novel about a would-be movie star in 1920s Berlin. Doris is going to be a big star. Wearing a stolen fur coat and recently fired from her office job, she takes an all-night train to Berlin to make it in the movies. But what she encounters in the city is not fame and fortune, but gnawing hunger, seedy bars, and exploitative men - and as Doris sinks ever lower, she resorts to desperate measures to survive. Very funny and intensely moving, this is a dazzling portrait of roaring Berlin in the 1920s, and a poignant exploration of the doomed pursuit of fame and glamour.
