Between supense feel and ... nausea ...

First book by Douglas Kenndy I discovered, I remained fairly shared after the end of my reading.
While the character Thomas Nesbitt, American journalist and novelist, is on the verge of divorce in the early 2000s, her past resurfaces when it receives a parcel from Germany, named Petra Dussmann. We saw throughout this novel River tortuous past and very painful for a young man who had great love in the person of the mysterious Petra, then at the height of Cold War, in a Germany divided between GDR and FRG .

All of this work suffers from many lengths; that do nothing about the plot, strictly speaking. It starts from the first part, which drags on unhappy childhood of Thomas Nesbitt, the failed marriage of his parents, his wanderings of a young man who becomes a novelist by chance traveling. He makes a decision that will change his fate; he decided to go to Germany for his next novel. It was then that he met Petra. But before reaching the thunderbolt, Kennedy plays extra time in plunging Thomas in the West Berlin "underground" of the time. The tales of his trips in the shady, murky and frankly sordid environments with his gay roommate Alastair gives us nausea. I wondered if I would continue reading this novel, so out of boredom than disgust. Sex, drugs but not so "rock 'n roll" that ...

Finally, after a long hangover, we really enters the plot itself as soon as Petra emerged in the second part of the book (it takes at least 200 pages before the lightning strike takes place!) . Kennedy knows how to play with our nerves, but more subtly maintaining a latent suspense. One can not but be moved by the tragic story of Petra, trapped by the Stasi.
The strengths of this novel are the suspense and the solid historical documentation Kennedy has undertaken to recount in detail the dark times of the former GDR and psychosis context that prevailed at the time. I dare say I went out less silly learning some pretty shocking things and upsetting.
However, one would have to spend barely tolerable descriptions of the abuse suffered Petra, especially in these "books" and these floods scenes of rape. Certainly, it is a sad historical reality of knowing some victims that have taken in the clutches of a totalitarian regime. But I had high start-heart ... always the same feeling of nausea.
At the end of the reading, one can only be shocked by the dark history of Petra. When this machine Machiavellian thriller s' is in place, it can hardly get. However, it should still have the faint of heart because of this murky atmosphere that permeates the story of "This moment-there."
Overall, I enjoyed this novel because of its historical interest and intrigue built around Thomas and Petra, but nothing more. But be careful, sensitive souls refrain ...