Excerpt from The Women in the Castle by Jessica Shattuck, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

Marianne stared at her. "I don't know." She drew herself up. "Does it matter? Our government is unleashing bands of thugs."

"It is the beginning of the end," the countess pronounced dramatically when she heard of the destruction that would later be referred to as Kristallnacht. "That Austrian will ruin this country."

With that, she went up to bed.

Marianne envied her freedom. She herself would have to shepherd this party to its bitter end.

As the news spread, guests with government roles or substantial properties in nearby cities took off down the hill, speeding drunkenly around curves, honking and flashing their headlights. They were followed, more soberly, by the few Jewish guests. A few voyeuristic idiots drove to the neighboring town of Ehrenheim to see how far the rioting had spread.

By the champagne fountain, Gerhardt Friedlander argued with the Stollmeyers, a set of drunken, ruddy-faced twins who were devoted Nazis. The crowd cleared a nervous circle around them.

"The conspiracy of world Jewry will not stop at murdering vom Rath," one of the Stollmeyers ranted. "We must take action against them—

"Don't be a fool," Gerhardt spat. "Vom Rath was killed by a deranged seventeen-year-old, not a conspiracy."

"A deranged seventeen-year-old who was a Jew and a Bolshevik," his opponent argued, "who wanted to destroy the pride and unity of the German Volk . . ."

Marianne could not listen. This absurd Nazi blather was every-where, ripe for adoption by the likes of the simpleminded Stollmeyers. How had those two ever made the guest list? Thank God Gerhardt was there to put them in their place.

In the great room, the jazz trio had disappeared (back to the Berlin? had they been paid?), and some dolt tried to play a Nazi marching record on the Victrola only to be pelted with a round of hot Frikadellenfrom the chef's latest offering. The gawkers who had driven to Ehrenheim returned and seemed almost disappointed to report that no, nothing was afoot. What did they expect? The town was thoroughly and pigheadedly Bavarian Catholic. It had no Jewish inhabitants or businesses.

Undaunted by the news or the departures, the cook continued to offer delicacies: a new round of pork roasts, apple tortes, a Frankfurter Kranz. And the bartender poured drinks.

Marianne wished the remaining guests would leave. They were all self-absorbed, and frivolous. But still the party limped along toward a slow death.

Around midnight, she allowed herself a moment of privacy in an empty trophy room decorated by some von Lingenfels hunter of yore. Its walls were bedecked with pale, delicate skulls of deer and moldering taxidermies of boar, bears, even a wolf. A cruel room, but it would do. She would rest for five minutes. Any longer and she would never return. As she sat, the expression fell from her face and the slackness that replaced it made her feel old, a mother of small children in a suddenly savage land.

"Aha!" A voice came from behind, and two hands fell on her shoulders before she had the chance to turn: Connie. She had thought him long gone—either back to Berlin to repair the damage or off to bed with his fiancée, a changed man with a new set of habits. But here he was. His intransigence reassured her.

"Caught you," he chided.

"Oh, Connie," she said, turning. "Should I tell them all to go home? It's so strange to have this party when beyond it, God knows—"

"Let them stay." Connie sank into the chair opposite her own. "They're too drunk to leave anyway."

"I suppose." Marianne sighed. "What's happening out there?"

"Well," Connie said, leaning back. "Greta von Viersdahl is im-personating a goose on the dance floor, old Herr Frickle has found a new strumpet to sit on his lap, and someone I don't know is vomiting into the moat."

Excerpted from The Women in the Castle by Jessica Shattuck. Copyright © 2017 by Jessica Shattuck. Excerpted by permission of William Morrow. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.