Open Books 2024: Books by a German author, or that take place in Germany

The Open Books Reading Challenge is a year-long reading challenge for people interested in pushing the boundaries of their reading. For full details of the program, please check-out our page at: https://www.rplmn.org/books-more/discover-more/open-books-reading-challenge

This list is to help you find books that fit the 2024 category of "Books by a German author, or that take place in Germany."

Happy Reading!


Updated December 19, 2023
RPL Staff
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The Thief Lord
Funke, Cornelia Caroline.
Paper Book
An exciting, magical adventure set among the crumbling canals and ancient ruins of Venice, Italy. Prosper and Bo are orphans on the run from their cruel aunt and uncle. The brothers decide to hide out in Venice, where they meet a mysterious character who calls himself the "Thief Lord."...
The book jumper
Gla ser, Mechthild
Paper Book
Amy Lennox doesn't know quite what to expect when she and her mother pick up and leave Germany for Scotland, heading to her mother's childhood home of Lennox House on the island of Stormsay. Amy's grandmother, Lady Mairead, insists that Amy must read while she resides at Lennox House...
Dear child
Hausmann, Romy
Paper Book
NOW A #1 NETFLIX ORIGINAL SERIES AND #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER "[A] tantalizingly disturbing debut...As enthralling as it is thought-provoking." -New York Times Book Review BookPage's Top 10 Mystery & Suspense of the Year Chicago Public...
When Hitler stole pink rabbit
Kerr, Judith.
Paper Book
Now a major motion picture, and based on the author's gripping real-life story, this international bestseller is perfect for Holocaust Remembrance Month. Anna is not sure who Hitler is, but she sees his face on posters all over Berlin. Then one morning, Anna and her brother awake...
The storyteller
Michaelis, Antonia.
Paper Book
Anna and Abel couldn't be more different. They are both seventeen and in their last year of school, but while Anna lives in a nice old town house and comes from a well-to-do family, Abel, the school drug dealer, lives in a big, prisonlike tower block at the edge of town. Anna is afraid of him...
Snow White must die
Neuhaus, Nele.
Paper Book
Snow White Must Dieby Nele Neuhaus is a tremendous new contemporary mystery series and huge international bestseller--with more than 3.5 million copies in print! On a rainy November day police detectives Pia Kirchhoff and Oliver von Bodenstein are summoned to a mysterious traffic...
To die in spring
Rothmann, Ralf
Paper Book
The lunacy of the final months of World War II, as experienced by a young German soldier Distant, silent, often drunk, Walter Urban is a difficult man to have as a father. But his son--the narrator of this slim, harrowing novel--is curious about Walter's experiences during...
28 days : a novel of resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto
Safier, David
Paper Book
Warsaw, 1942. Sixteen-year old Mira smuggles food into the Warsaw Ghetto to keep herself and her family alive. When she discovers that the entire Ghetto is to be "liquidated"--killed or "resettled" to concentration camps--she desperately tries to find a way to save her family. She meets a group of...
The art of hearing heartbeats : a novel
Sendker, Jan-Philipp.
Audiobook
A poignant and inspirational love story set in Burma, The Art of Hearing Heartbeats spans the decades between the 1950s and the present. When a successful New York lawyer suddenly disappears without a trace, neither his wife nor his daughter Julia has any idea where he might be--until they...
The end of loneliness
Wells, Benedict
Paper Book
From internationally bestselling author Benedict Wells, a sweeping novel of love and loss, and of the lives we never get to live "[D]azzling storytelling...The End of Loneliness is both affecting and accomplished -- and eternal." --John Irving "An...
The most dazzling girl in Berlin
Wilson, Kip
Paper Book
A fascinating historical novel about Hilde, an orphan who experiences Berlin on the cusp of World War II as she discovers her own voice and sexuality, ultimately finding a family when she gets a job at a gay cabaret, by award-winning author Kip Wilson. On her eighteenth birthday, Hilde...

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