A Review - The Luck of the Weissensteiners

I gave this book 5 out of 5 stars.

This was not reading a book. This was experiencing literature.

First a word of warning for the faint of heart, or casual reader: This is a well-crafted work of literature.  It makes excellent and proper use of language. If you have never read a great work of literature you may feel overwhelmed. This is to be expected. What you should do, in this case, is sit back and let the story educate and enlighten your mind as well as entertain and enthrall your spirit.

That said… Wow! I’m personally used to reading and writing books that are a bit grittier and dirtier in language/tone/subject matter than this. This is not a bubble gum read. The word choice and sentence structure used is truly inspired, and shows artistry that is lost to more than 90% of writers today, I'd wager. I was barely into this book and I felt that I was reading a work that had been published out of its era, as though it were a classic work, only discovered and released in the modern age. I would have believed this book was written in the time it was set in.

As always, I will give no spoilers in a review, but I will speak to what you can expect from the work as a whole. The tale is set in 1930’s Europe, and shows us the lives, loves, fear, passions, and prejudices that effected and informed the lives of peoples who were impacted so greatly by Nazi Germany. Jew and Catholic alike, even Lutheran, no one was immune to the social implications of policies gaining traction at that time.

The themes the author chose to addressed, from classism and anti-Semitism to religious bias, mental illness, and sexual orientation, were all well presented in plot, and nothing felt forced or even slightly out of place. I was, and still am amazed at the quality of craftsmanship shown in the storytelling.

I started reading this book with expectations, based on its subject matter and the time period it as set in. Those expectations were shattered.

I expected a work of fiction. This was a work of art.



- Dennis Sharpe



The Luck of the Weissensteiners on Goodreads.com

The Luck of the Weissensteiners on Amazon.com (paperback)

The Luck of the Weissensteiners on Amazon.com (kindle)

The Luck of the Weissensteiners on Amazon.co.uk (paperback)

The Luck of the Weissensteiners on Amazon.co.uk (kindle)