Andreas Götz's new thriller "You can't see them in the dark" is about the art of robbery by the Nazis - and of course about murder.
Wartenberg - "You can't see them in the dark" is an exciting crime novel by Andreas Götz, which took place in Munich around 1950 and which sheds light on the never fully clarified question of what happened to the art of robbery by the Nazis. In an interview with our newspaper in the Wartenberger bookstore bookstore (before the Corona crisis), the author talked about the passion of writing, the difficulty and luck of earning money as a writer, and details about the development process of his well-researched crime novel.
Author Götz wrote as a child
Götz grew up on a farm in Holzhausen between Langenpreising and Wartenberg. He was enthusiastic about writing even as a child: "I always had fun making up stories." At the age of nine / ten, he was fascinated as a reader by Karl May's works and wrote Western stories himself. The multi-reader knew early on that he wanted to write himself. Götz, who was born in 1965, studied German, Theater Studies and American Studies in Munich and lives as a freelance writer in Moosburg. He has already published two thrillers for young readers.
Immerse yourself in a Munich shortly after World War II
Munich itself plays a major role in the crime novel “You can't see them in the dark”. Götz lets the reader roam the city shortly after the Second World War, with elegant cafes, wicked clubs and smoky pubs. One encounters stranded livelihoods who are looking for a new life. The central question is the art of robbery, which disappeared from the so-called Führerbau in Munich in 1945 under unclear circumstances - "Unresolved that extends to the present day".
The research took around two years
For around two years, the author has researched, searched the Munich city archive, researched old newspapers and photographs, read secondary literature to get answers to the question "How was life, how was everyday life?".
As with a good film, you are drawn more and more into the plot, which is remote in time and at the same time seems close at hand. The reader gradually gets to know the protagonists - about what they reveal and what they hide. They are figures with breaks, injuries, abysses. The author developed his figures "at eye level". There is no omniscient narrator, which reinforces the immediacy of the narrative.
In the beginning there is a brutal murder
The torn Karl Wieners, whose life is in ruins, wants to make a fresh start as a journalist. His fun-loving and at the same time melancholy niece Magda becomes his companion on a dangerous mission - an ambivalent, strong-willed female figure. The police investigated Ludwig Gruber, a friend of the journalist. Because at the beginning of the crime there is a brutal murder, which turns out to be the tip of the iceberg.
The coherent language, the historical background, which the author gives a gripping momentum of its own, and the exciting plot make "You can't see them in the dark" a reading adventure with a pull effect. The novel is the first part of a planned trilogy.
The Krimifrühschoppen with Andreas Götz in the Eicherloher hunting lodge "Maxlruh", which was organized by Marianne Lehmer, the local cultural adviser and owner of the "bookstore" in Wartenberg, had to be canceled at short notice due to the corona crisis - but it has not been put off. And free hours to read are now likely to be found much sooner in the state-prescribed period of retreat than a few weeks ago in the hectic everyday life.
the novel
"You can't see them in the dark" was published by Fischer Verlag and costs 16.99 euros.
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