Api’s Berlin Diaries

Api’s Berlin Diaries

by Gabriel Robinson

A haunting personal story of the last days of the Third Reich in Berlin 1945--an unflinching investigation into a beloved grandfather’s Nazi past

In this moving memoir author Gabrielle Robinson recounts the shocking discovery that Api, her grandfather, had been a Nazi. She found his diaries only after her mother’s death hidden behind books. They record his daily struggle to survive in an inner city that was 90% destroyed. Near collapse himself, he tried to help the wounded and dying in dark medical cellars without even water. The dead were stacked in the rubble outside.

Searching for answers why Api had joined the Nazi party, Robinson retraces his steps in the Berlin of the 21st century. She reflects on German guilt, political responsibility, and facing the past. But she also remembers Api, the man who had given her a loving home in those cold and hungry post-war years when they were refugees in a farmer’s cottage without indoor plumbing.

“This is a must read for anyone interested in the German experience during WWII”—Ariana Neumann, author of When Time Stopped