Germany

Katharina Hacker

Katharina Hacker’s previous books, Morpheus (2003) and The Lifeguard (2000), have earned her a reputation as one of the most discerning and elegant stylists in contemporary German literature. Born in 1967 in Frankfurt, she has lived in Berlin since 1996.

Hacker's German Book Prize

Listen to an interview with Katharina Hacker in Deutche Radio's "Inspired Minds" podcast

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Latest reviews

THE HAVE-NOTS WON THE German Book Prize, which I take to be the equivalent of the Booker, for the best novel of 2006. It's certainly a serious and impressive work, dense in the best sense of the word. By that, I mean that there is not only a lot happening on the surface, but...

— Jul 1 2008

The title characters, the have-nots of this unsettling novel, are not its protagonists but rather features of the human landscape in which its more advantaged central characters act out their amorphous crises. As the novel opens, a young Berlin lawyer named Jakob has experienced...

— Mar 31 2008

from 3% The Have-Nots By Katharina Hacker Translated by Helen Atkins Reviewed by Jeff Waxman At the outset, I didn’t particularly care for this book. Yet, as a work of fiction, The Have-Nots bears no great deficiencies and has, in fact, a certain charm...

— Mar 26 2008

Katharina Hacker’s The Have-Nots has won lots of prizes, raves, and sales in her native Germany, and now, thanks to the bold folk at Europa Editions, promises to shake up American readers who don’t see that many German thrillers as good as this. by Dick Adler

— Feb 19 2008

Verdict: Hacker’s plain sentences and long paragraphs bring to mind William Faulkner’s deceptively simple narrative style. This honest portrayal of the dark side of the human psyche understandably won the 2006 German Book Prize for best novel. Recommended for public and academic...

— Feb 1 2008

Hacker (Morpheus; The Lifeguard) entwines the lives of three unusual households in post-9/11 suburban London. Isabelle and Jakob are 30-something German newlyweds who move to Britain after Jakob takes the job of a colleague killed on 9/11. Jakob is an attorney and Isabelle is...

— Dec 8 2007

“With strong, clear brushstrokes, Hacker has given us an unyielding portrait of these our ambiguous times. She has succeeded in creating a novel that is at the same time a smart, critical analysis of contemporary times and an exciting read.”—Die Zeit (Hamburg)

— Oct 8 2006

“This novel accomplishes something outstanding: not only is it very well-written, intelligent, touching, and spellbinding, it is also significant... It’s most captivating feature is its considerable psychological breadth.”—Frankfurter Rundschau (Frankfurt)

— Sep 16 2006

“Katharina Hacker proves that, like the older generation of writers, our younger authors are also capable of offering their contemporaries books that are genuine revelations, that elucidate the urgent questions of our time.”—Die Welt (Hamburg)

— May 4 2006