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Phyllis Edgerly Ring

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The Munich Girl: A Novel of the Legacies that Outlast War Kindle Edition

by Phyllis Edgerly Ring (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

4.2 1,491 ratings

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Anna Dahlberg grew up eating dinner under her father’s war-trophy portrait of Eva Braun.
Fifty years after the war, she discovers what he never did—that her mother and Hitler’s mistress were friends.

The secret surfaces with a mysterious monogrammed handkerchief, and a man, Hannes Ritter, whose Third Reich family history is entwined with Anna’s.

Plunged into the world of the “ordinary” Munich girl who was her mother’s confidante—and a tyrant’s lover—Anna finds her every belief about right and wrong challenged. With Hannes’s help, she retraces the path of two women who met as teenagers, shared a friendship that spanned the years that Eva Braun was Hitler’s mistress, yet never knew that the men they loved had opposing ambitions.

Eva’s story reveals that she never joined the Nazi party, had Jewish friends, and was credited at the Nuremberg Trials with saving 35,000 Allied lives. As Anna's journey leads back through the treacherous years in wartime Germany, it uncovers long-buried secrets and unknown reaches of her heart to reveal the enduring power of love in the legacies that always outlast war.

Print length

358 pages
Language

English
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On Kindle Scribe
Publication date

January 7, 2016
File size

2908 KB
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Editorial Reviews

Review

The plot flows like a river with the author sliding in and out of tributaries that continually add context,illumination, and depth. Anna's tale is the current. It sweeps readersalong as she discovers things about her husband she doesn't really wantto know, then uncovers information from her mother's past she finds hard to believe and accept, and finally shines a light on a dark figure from history that few have ever understood.... Peggy and Eva's war years in some ofthe Third Reich's most iconic settings unspool like flickering black and white images of life in those ruinous days. ~ US Review of Books
I was drawn in by Phyllis Ring's economical and expressive language.Then the story took over! Protagonist Anna Dahlberg must face the emotional fallout from a traumatic plane crash, while simultaneously uncovering the first clues in a shocking generational mystery involving key players in the Third Reich. Everything's complicated by a new romance that may help her overcome the past and find her true inner strength. But is it real? Love can manifest itself in enigmatic--and unexpected--ways. ~ Elizabeth Sims, author and contributing editor at Writer's Digest magazine

... fresh perspective of German women at opposing ends of the warring spectrum ... a beautiful story of enduring friendship and the lengths people will go to for love.
~ The Stellar Review

So persuasive is this novel that, before I could believe it was in fact a piece of fiction, I contacted the author and asked where she did her research and where she came up with the idea.
~ Leslie Handler, The Philadelphia Inquirer

From the Author

I've twice donned a pair of white cotton gloves and pored over Eva Braun's nearly three dozen photograph albums at the National Archives.

Each visit had its own rhythm and pace. The first, in the spring of 2010, was a kind of mad-rush count-down to get through them all before the Archives' five o'clock closing time. This involved leaving at least 15-20 extra minutes on each end for passing through security, checking in or out,and depositing or retrieving my belongings from a locker.

I couldn't take so much as my own pencil into the resource room where her albums are housed in several piles of volumes hard-bound in dark blue. Overwhelmed as I encountered them for the first time, I was attempting to encompass 33 years of one life in the equivalent of two afternoons.

Years of reading and research later, including interviews with some of those who met the subject of my search, my approach on the second visit was more like forensics. I was watching, among those several dozen books of her photos, most arranged quite haphazardly with little attention to chronological order, for patterns and connections that form a larger picture.

There are many photos whose settings and significance I could spot more readily, based on who was present, clues in the background of interiors and landscapes, even the clothes people were wearing.

But it was that most-elusive quarry that I was watching for -- the evidence of the emotional side of things. By the time I made the second visit, the years that I've spent following the trail of this life, as my novel's protagonist does, have led somewhere deeper. In much the way I can with photos of those whom I know, I can tell when a day was a joy, or a strain; when a smile was a spontaneous response, or a tight, forced mask.

Seven years onto this trail, I trolled those hundreds of images, watching for the signs of where the shifts came. Watching for those large and little junctures at which a life was repeatedly bartered away in the shadow of another, to the detriment of its self.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B01AC4FHI8
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Whole Sky Books; 1st edition (January 7, 2016)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 7, 2016
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2908 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 358 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #99,979 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #528 in Cultural Heritage Fiction
- #1,120 in Saga Fiction
- #1,783 in Family Saga Fiction

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4.2 1,491 ratings

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Phyllis Edgerly Ring

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As she writes fiction and nonfiction, Phyllis Edgerly Ring watches for the noblest possibilities in the human heart. She's always curious to discover how history, culture, relationships, spirituality, and the natural world influence us and point the way for the human family on our shared journey.

Her newest novel, The Munich Girl: A Novel of the Legacies That Outlast War, traces a pathway of love and secrets in WWII Germany when protagonist Anna Dahlberg discovers that her mother shared a secret friendship with Hitler's mistress, Eva Braun. Her journey to discover the truth about this, and her own life, will challenge most every belief she has about right and wrong.

The author has worked as writer, editor, nurse, tour guide, program director at a Baha'i conference center, taught English to kindergartners in China, and served as instructor for the Long Ridge Writer's Group. She has written for such publications as Christian Science Monitor, Ms., Writer's Digest, and Yankee, and also published several nonfiction books about creating balance between the spiritual and material aspects of life. More information can be found at her blog, Leaf of the Tree: https://phyllisedgerlyring.wordpress.com/

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Dry Gulch

An interesting life.

Reviewed in the United States on February 23, 2024

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A fascinating novel that examines the life of a young Munich girl at the center of Hitler's life. I have been to most the places mentioned in this novel and I can visualize the context. A recommended read.

One person found this helpful

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Mary Eve

The Munich Girl

Reviewed in the United States on December 18, 2019

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First, I'd like to thank the Goodreads gods for their generous giveaways. A fun perk of being a Goodreads member, the giveaways offer a reader the opportunity to read/review a book well before a book's release date. Authors rely heavily on a reviewer's unique perspective to spread a book's popularity (or unpopularity. It happens.). I'm a firm believer in returning the favor. If you receive a book as a gift or giveaway, a few thoughtful words is a nice way to show your appreciation for an author and the many "Goodreads" we've been provided. Thank you, authors and publishers!

<i>The Munich Girl</i> had been staring back from my Kindle screen for months. I did not realize that the woman on the cover was Eva Braun. I can honestly say that I've never been a fan of hers. I'd be lying if I said I didn't find Braun to be an interesting subject. What a curious woman! What possessed this woman to love the embodiment of evil? Hitler's chauffeur, Eric Kempa, labeled Eva "the unhappiest woman in Germany". We will never know her true feelings about the path she chose and the reasons she sacrificed her life for the most selfish, vicious man in history, but Phyllis Edgerly Ring offers the reader small glimpses into a secretive, doomed relationship.

Edgerly Ring's story is brimming with secrets, hidden pasts, and stunning revelations. One ordinary woman will discover that her life is extraordinarily intertwined with Eva Braun's. The life she's known will change forever.

Whilst reading, I did become annoyed on more than one occasion. I feel like the author was trying to convince me to accept Hitler's human side through Eva's love. Well, I lost my patience with that. What I did find interesting (and confusing) was Eva's unconditional acceptance and adoration for the most pathetic excuse of a man. Eva seemed blinded, like a teenager in love. Perhaps if she'd been allowed to spend more time with the spawn of Satan, Eva would've been able to rid herself of this monster. Then again, she seemed to go down this path willingly. She had to have known what she signed up for. Eva was like a mother who still loves her serial killing child. Edgerly Ring tried hard to change my mind about Braun, asking me to view her as a good Catholic girl that sacrificed everything for her man. I cannot accept Braun as a heroine who was caring, kind, and thoughtful. I will NOT! Heroines that are truly good do not bed the twisted Führer. Or, maybe they do. But, eventually a REAL heroine kicks that creep to the curb. Ok. So, all that behind me...being indifferent to Braun's good nature does not keep me from calling this storyline interesting. Knowing very little about the elusive mistress of Hitler, and despite hating both, I can definitely say that the storyline was interesting. Edgerly Ring uses historical archives and extensive research to create a story that, while not totally believable, did manage to consume my thoughts. Once again, I'll confess to copious Googling — one subject sent me off to another. Plus, I chose this book to accompany another title I'm reading, <i>BLITZED: Drugs in the Third Reich</i> by Norman Ohler. While Edgerly Ring's is historical fiction, Ohler's is nonfiction. I can't help but wonder, what did Eva Braun think of Hitler's drug habit? Like everything else, I assume she looked the other way. According to Ohler, every German was experimenting with some form of dope during WWII — it was even distributed in candies! They say we make poor decisions as dope fiends. Maybe that was Eva's excuse.

"And finally, there was Eva the paradox. Slavishly devoted to Hitler, she never joined the Nazi party, had Jewish friends, and a churchgoing Catholic’s conscience. A well-brought-up girl from a respectable, even conservative, Munich family, she had chosen the utterly disreputable life of a mistress. This, in her time, had sentenced her to a furtive, secretive existence. She’d had access to more wealth and comfort than most people could imagine during the war years, yet she’d confided to trusted friends that she was little more than a bird kept in a gilded cage."

In fact, Hitler's

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Lawrence Moffitt

Great read for people who love good historical fiction

Reviewed in the United States on December 31, 2015

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Anna, daughter of Peggy who was a close friend of Eva Braun in Germany, comes across the pages of her mother’s loose-leaf diary that begins pre-war with Peggy’s first meeting with Eva the shopgirl who has a passion for photography.

The best historical fiction, of which this book is one, is a compelling story informed by thorough research. To render the innermost thoughts of people who actually lived, with the right pitch and timbre to convincingly pull the reader into their world, is literary artistry. Phyllis Edgerly Ring accomplishes this, masterfully inserting us into the reality of the time, locations, events of Eva, Hitler, wartime Germany. We are there.

This is the story of Eva Braun, Hitler’s invisible woman, and the story of Eva’s friendship with Peggy. It’s also the story of Anna fifty years later, peeling back layers of mystery surrounding Peggy and the painting of Eva that had always hung in their living room when Anna was growing up. There are a couple of riveting encounters with Hitler, but the book is not principally about him.

At its heart, The Munich Girl is two intriguing love stories in different times. In addition to the story of Eva and Hitler, as seen through the eyes of Peggy, there is Anna fifty years later. Peggy’s daughter is a betrayed and put-aside wife who develops a closeness with her editor, Hannes. Her and Hanne’s growing relationship is interwoven in Anna’s search for her family’s connection to Eva, as well as Hanne’s own family history in wartime Germany. Going back and forth between the two eras begins to reveal startling connections between Anna, Hannes and the people at the very center of the tragedy that was Nazi Germany.

The 1940s in Germany is like a train wreck from which you can’t avert your eyes, and we’ve seen the newsreels of mesmerized masses seig-heiling Hitler’s motorcade. Ring gives us the hearts and minds of “the other Germany,” the traumatized, exhausted, terrorized, starving Germany and the people whose existence was one of scurrying back and forth between bomb shelters and food lines. “In order to know whether your bread was buttered,” Peggy records in her diary, “you had to hold it up to the light, where its shine would show you it was.”

Testimony at Nuremberg revealed that Eva Braun had diverted Hitler’s final order to execute the Amereican and European POWs, and thus saved thousands of lives. She had access and did not suffer rationing, but neither was she oblivious. She was a lonely and perhaps needy woman who lived the two-edged blessing/curse of being the Führer's favorite.

Phyllis Edgerly Ring creates her characters in three dimensions. She lets them breathe and get on with their lives. And then she does a spot-on job of being a fly on the wall, observing everything with great clarity. Ring’s prose style is rich, layered and captivating, and I found myself going back to re-read or highlight a sentence or paragraph I thought really nailed it. I don’t usually read a novel twice, but I am already a third of the way through my second round of The Munich Girl.

7 people found this helpful

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citygirl

I found it very confusing...

Reviewed in the United States on August 14, 2023

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I liked the book, but did find it very confusing. Who & where it fit into the story!
The story was interesting but I lost track of who was involved .

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Vision Quest

Athought-provoking and deeply moving novel

Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2023

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In "The Munich Girl" by Phyllis Edgerly Ring, Anna Dahlberg is forced to confront the complexities of her family history when she discovers a monogrammed handkerchief and uncovers the secret that her mother was friends with Eva Braun, Hitler's mistress.

The novel takes readers on a journey through the lives of the two women who met as teenagers and maintained their friendship over the years that Eva Braun was involved with Hitler. As Anna delves deeper into the lives of these women, she finds herself challenged to reassess her beliefs about right and wrong.

This is a thought-provoking and deeply moving novel that challenges readers to confront their own beliefs about love, loyalty, and morality. Ring's writing is lyrical and evocative, and her exploration of the lives of these women is both illuminating and haunting.

This is a must-read for anyone interested in the enduring power of love and the complexities of the human heart.

2 people found this helpful

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Rosa Demanins

An excellent novel

Reviewed in Spain on November 23, 2018

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I loved this book for its original story, its original outlook on the woman that was Eva Braun, and it is also full of reality-bites as well. There are surprising twists and revelations that leave a reader just thrilled. Kudos to the author, a wonderful read.

Dave

Anna's history isn't like yours.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 5, 2018

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This is a wonderful eye opening book that tells the story of the human and caring side of a family and a friend that was never mentioned and a history her daughter Anna never knew. Anna trapped in a loveless marriage is unaware that her life is about to change after her Mum (Peggy) dies. Even more surprising is the history her Mum has that she only found out about after she died and her husband well i let you read that bit. Her Mums friend is the woman in Hitler's life Eva Braun (whom her Mum had some close shaves with) .. This is a story that tells the human side of a relationship in the build up and during the The Second World War based on people rather than guns and hate, with the story off Anna in 1995. It turns out that Anna's Mum met Eva when they were both young teenagers on a train when Peggy helps Eva and befriends her at a railway station and they share a journey from the Austrian border deeper into Germany. What follows is the moving story of that relationship and how Eva is very different to her partner why she chooses the path she does is a mystery but isn't that the case with most out us but obviously not with such evil. It is true that some are blinded by love to such a unbelievable level that just seems beyond understanding, it as in this case stay with someone after they change in such a unbelievable way. I have to remind myself that the vast majority of soldiers that fought for the Germans did so with full commitment to what they felt was a true and justifiable cause, as has been the case throughout history for so many Armies it would be hard to count them all.
It is often hard to see good in the lives that history has blackened I'm not referring to the Nazis but to individuals and so this story is about individuals that have partners with strongly opposing views as in the men in their lives are on different sides of the war one a Austrian the other a German Jew.
This is a deep and challenging book that I think is for both men and women there is the love story but there is a lot more to it than this there is the well I'm not going to spoil it but I think this is a must read book and I'm very glad i have. I hope you do as well.

Liz

Amazing, fascinating and deep

Reviewed in Australia on April 16, 2020

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Complimentary copy received from voracious readers only for an honest review.

Loved this fascinating look at Eva Braun and Germany during WWII.

Lena A Scallion

Interesting and Engaging

Reviewed in Canada on October 4, 2016

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It was a most interesting book and I enjoyed every moment I spent with the characters. I missed them when it was over.

One person found this helpful

Susanne Weigand

An uplifting (and in parts sad) story

Reviewed in Germany on March 13, 2016

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Bear with me when I am talking about myself. I am German and both my parents have lived through WWII and it was something we often talked about in my family. And in my time at school we were taught a lot about the war and Nazism. Later I read a lot of articles and several books about this dark period of German history. But for some reason I always shied away from learning more about Eva Braun, probably because I couldn’t understand why a young woman would willingly devote herself to a man like Hitler. So when I learned that Phyllis Edgerly Ring had written a book about her I became very curious.
I like the picture that the author has drawn of Eva Braun, her pride and her ambition, her insecurities and loneliness, her devotion and heartbreaking friendship and the story of her life.
But, and this is more important: This book is offering so much more. The story of three women (and only one of them is Eva) and how their lives crossed and intertwined. The story of a family and their complicated, but heartwarming connections. And even a love story I enjoyed. (And I seldom enjoy love stories, mostly they are too cheesy and sweet.)

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