Fifty years after the end of World War II, Jewish-American veteran George Bromfield dies suspiciously in a New York hospital. Could it be that his second wife precipitated his death? Attempting to uncover the mysterious circumstances of his death, his daughter Eva and her brother Max dig deeper and deeper into their father's secretive past. In Munich and New York, the siblings go in search of clues to find out why their father returned to Bavaria at the end of the war and explore how this ties into his friendship with a portrait painter and Nazi collaborator.
Titled Händler der Geheimnisse (Merchant of Secrets) Elisabeth Bronfen deftly blends a spy story with a family drama, depicting the aftermath of a culture of secrecy that characterized the postwar period from 1945 onward.
Elisabeth Bronfen's first novel is published by Limmat Verlag.