Api’s Berlin Diaries

A haunting personal story of Berlin at the end of the Third Reich—and an unflinching investigation into a family’s Nazi past

When Gabrielle Robinson found her grandfather’s Berlin diaries, hidden behind books in her mother’s Vienna apartment, she made a shocking discovery—her beloved Api had been a Nazi.

The entries record his daily struggle to survive in a Berlin that was 90% destroyed. Near collapse himself Api, a doctor, tried to help the wounded and dying in nightmarish medical cellars without cots, water or light. The dead were stacked in the rubble outside.

Searching to understand why her grandfather 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, who had given her a loving home in those cold and hungry post-war years.

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

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