germany (east)

The Berlin Wall went up in 1961. A year later a group of young West Germans risked prison, Stasi torture, and even death to liberate friends, lovers, and even strangers in East Berlin by digging tunnels under the Wall. When American channels NBC and CBS heard about it, they funded two separate tunnels in return for the right to film the escapes, planning spectacular prime-time documentary specials. President John F. Kennedy was not in favor of the plan because he was worried that the Soviets might take offense. As he said, "a wall is better than a war." In an era of escalating nuclear tensions, he approved unprecedented maneuvers to halt both documentaries, testing the limits of a free press.

In this illuminating and deeply moving memoir, a former American military intelligence officer goes beyond traditional Cold War espionage tales to tell the true story of her family?of five women separated by the Iron Curtain for more than forty years, and their miraculous reunion after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

When the Berlin Wall went up, Gerta, her mother, and her brother Fritz are trapped on the eastern side where they were living, while her father, and her other brother Dominic are in the West--four years later, now twelve, Gerta sees her father on a viewing platform on the western side and realizes he wants her to risk her life trying to tunnel to freedom.

"Simon Schwartz was born in 1982 in the GDR (East Germany). One and a half years later, he left the country with his parents, and the family resettled in West Berlin. As political dissidents, his parents experienced harassment by the Stasi and a lack of understanding from members of their own family. This graphic novel memoir chronicles the family's difficult journey to get to the other side of the Berlin Wall"--Provided by publisher.

When the Berlin Wall went up, Gerta, her mother, and her brother Fritz are trapped on the eastern side where they were living, while her father, and her other brother Dominic are in the West--four years later, now twelve, Gerta sees her father on a viewing platform on the western side and realizes he wants her to risk her life trying to tunnel to freedom.

A graphic novel chronicling the lives of the author and illustrator's parents in East Germany, before the Berlin Wall fell, while the Socialist Unity Party of Germany was in power. Explores the hardships of life under communism and why the author's parents tried to leave and get into West Germany.

Story of a group of female East German athletes who dominated international sports during the 1970s through a state-sponsored drug program which administered steroids to the young athletes.

Discusses the psychological issues at work in the lives of East Germans as a result of living under Communist rule which are making it difficult for the people to adjust to democracy, and expresses concern that the two Germanies, in their rush to reunification, have failed to deal with their Nazi past.