Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Feb 2012
384 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
Award-winning author Anna Funder delivers an affecting and beautifully evocative debut novel about a group of young German exiles who risk their lives to awaken the world to the terrifying threat of Hitler and Nazi Germany. Based on real-life events and people, All That I Am brings to light the heroic, tragic, and true story of a small group of left-wing German social activists who mounted a fierce and cunning resistance from their perilous London exile, in a novel that fans of Suite Francaise, The Piano Teacher, and Atonement will find irresistible and unforgettable.
"The disquieting historical facts entwined by themes of love and betrayal are powerful enough to make up for flat-footed storytelling." - Kirkus Reviews
"[Funder] adds an integral perspective on a shopworn subject by invoking the lives of Nazi dissidents whose attempts to alert the world to the growing menace were ignored until it was too late." - Publishers Weekly
"A literary work as suspenseful as the best thrillers, Funder's extraordinary first novel is an unflinching portrait of courage in devastating circumstances." - Library Journal
"An intimate exploration of human connection and our responsibility to one another." - Colum McCann, author of Let the Great World Spin
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: © Courtesy of the author
Anna Funder is the author of Stasiland and All That I Am, and the novella The Girl with the Dogs. Stasiland, hailed as a "classic," tells true stories of ordinary people who heroically resisted the communist dictatorship of East Germany, and of others who worked for the Stasi. In 2004 Stasiland won the UK's premier award for non-fiction, the Samuel Johnson Prize, and was a finalist for many other awards. Anna's novel All That I Am is an homage to four German anti-Hitler activists living bravely but precariously in exile in London in the 1930s. All That I Am won many literary awards including Australia's most prestigious, the Miles Franklin Prize, and was a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Award and the Commonwealth Writers Prize. It spent over a year on the bestseller lists, was...
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