Peachy Reads

Hitler’s back, that’s who.  Strangely, inexplicably, Hitler reappears in modern-day Berlin, his formal uniform reeking of gasoline, seventy years after his supposed death.  The circumstances of his reappearance are reminiscent of Rip van Winkle.  He marvels at the new technology (untested avenues for his propaganda apparatus?), the multicultural face of Berlin (was there a military alliance with Turkey?), and many other aspects of modern society in a Berlin he last saw in ruins.  He soon stumbles into a career on television.  People treat him like Sacha Baron Cohen playing Borat. Look Who's Back has become a publishing phenomenon in Germany, and has been translated for many international markets, and banned in Israel. This book is meant as pure satire and there are some amusing passages, though there are other places where the attempt at humor seems to be pushing the boundaries of good taste.   Even though the translator provides an appendix outlining key historical figures

Grace Reinhart is a couples therapist in New York City on the cusp of making the big time with a book that’s getting lots of buzz entitled  You Should Have Known .   The book is about how couples who face discord later in a marriage really should have seen it coming from the start-- the clues are always there, the fatal personality and relationship flaws obvious from the get-go, but somehow signs are ignored, until later down the line it all goes “kerflooey”.   Grace’s professional  standing, her  modest but comfortable Upper East Side apartment, son in an exclusive Manhattan private school, husband a doctor with at a prestigious hospital—it all seems so perfect and her bio should look rather nice on the jacket flap of her soon-to-be New York Times bestselling title.   But the advice she doles out to her patients and records in her book come back to haunt her—you really should have known, Grace Reinhart.  At times this novel almost reads like Gone Girl or The Girl on the Train