For decades the painting was believed to be lost. But, just as mysteriously as it disappeared, it reappears, an anonymous donation to a gallery in Sydney. The art world is stunned but so are the three men who loved the woman in the painting, the woman on the stairs. One by one they track her down to an isolated cottage in Australia. Here they must try to untangle the lies and betrayals of their shared past - but time is running out. The Woman on the Stairs is an intricately-crafted, poignant and beguiling novel about creativity and love, about the effects of time passing and the regrets that haunt us all.

A #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER 'Bernhard Schlink speaks straight to the heart' New York Times 'Brilliant... A tale of love and loss in 20th century Germany' Evening Standard 'A cleverly-constructed tale of cross-class romance' Mail on Sunday 'A poignant portrait of a woman out of step with her time' Observer Olga is an orphan raised by her grandmother in a Prussian village around the turn of the 20th century. Smart and precocious, she fights against the prejudices of the time to find her place in a world that sees her as second-best. When she falls in love with Herbert, a local aristocrat obsessed with the era's dreams of power, glory and greatness, her life is irremediably changed. Theirs is a love against all odds, entwined with the twisting paths of German history, leading us from the late 19th to the early 21st century, from Germany to Africa and the Arctic, from the Baltic Sea to the German south-west. This is the story of that love, of Olga's devotion to a restless man - told in thought, letters and in a fateful moment of great rebellion.

'A thriller, a love story and a deeply moving examination of a German conscience' [Independent on Saturday] For 15-year-old Michael Berg, a chance meeting with an older woman leads to far more than he ever imagined. The woman in question is Hanna, and before long they embark on a passionate, clandestine love affair which leaves Michael both euphoric and confused. For Hanna is not all she seems. Years later, as a law student observing a trial in Germany, Michael is shocked to realize that the person in the dock is Hanna. The woman he had loved is a criminal. Much about her behaviour during the trial does not make sense. But then suddenly, and terribly, it does - Hanna is not only obliged to answer for a horrible crime, she is also desperately concealing an even deeper secret.

An exceptionally powerful novel exploring the themes of betrayal, guilt and memory against the background of the Holocaust. An international bestseller. For 15-year-old Michael Berg, a chance meeting with an older woman leads to far more than he ever imagined. The woman in question is Hanna, and before long they embark on a passionate, clandestine love affair which leaves Michael both euphoric and confused. For Hanna is not all she seems. Years later, as a law student observing a trial in Germany, Michael is shocked to realize that the person in the dock is Hanna. The woman he had loved is a criminal. Much about her behaviour during the trial does not make sense. But then suddenly, and terribly, it does - Hanna is not only obliged to answer for a horrible crime, she is also desperately concealing an even deeper secret. 'A tender, horrifying novel that shows blazingly well how the Holocaust should be dealt with in fiction. A thriller, a love story and a deeply moving examination of a German conscience' INDEPENDENT

"Old friends and lovers reunite for a weekend in a secluded country home after spending decades apart."
They excavate old memories and pass clandestine judgments on the wildly divergent paths they've taken since their youth. But this isn't just any reunion, and their conversations about the old days aren't your typical reminiscences: After twenty-four years, Jorg, a convicted murderer and terrorist, has been released from prison. The announcement of his pardon will send shock waves through the country, but before the announcement, his friends--some of whom were Baader-Meinhof sympathizers or those who clung to them--gather for his first weekend of freedom. They have been summoned by Jorg's devoted sister, Christiane, whose concern for her brother's safety is matched only by the unrelenting zeal of Marko, a young man intent on having Jorg continue to fight for the cause.
Bernhard Schlink is at his finest as "The Weekend" unfolds. Passions are pitted against pragmatism, ideas against actions, and hopes against heartbreaking realities.

"From the Hardcover edition."

A classic noir thriller about love and deception from the bestselling author of "The Reader."
Georg Polger ekes out a lonely living as a freelance translator in the south of France, until he is approached by a certain Mr. Bulnakov, who has a intriguing proposition: Georg is to take over a local translation agency and finish a project left by the previous owner, who died in a mysterious accident. The money is right and then there is the matter of Bulnakov's secretary, Francoise, with whom Georg has fallen hopelessly in love. Late one night, however, Georg discovers Francoise secretly photographing a sensitive military project. He is shocked and heartbroken. Then, her eventual disappearance leaves him not only bereft, but suspicious of the motivations behind Mr. Bulnakov's offer. To make matters worse, Georg's every move is being watched. Determined to find out who Francoise really is, and to foil who ever is tracking him, Georg sets out on an mission that will take him to New York City, where with each step he is dragged deeper and deeper into a deadly whirlpool in which friend and foe are indistinguishable.

Bernhard Schlink brings to these seven superbly crafted stories the same sleek concision and moral acuity that made The Reader an international bestseller. His characters–men with importunate appetites and unfortunate habits of deception–are uneasily suspended between the desire for love and the impulse toward flight.
A young boy’s fascination with an eerily erotic painting gradually leads him into the labyrinth of his family’s secrets. The friendship between a West Berliner and an idealistic young couple from the East founders amid the prosperity and revelations that follow the collapse of communism. An acrobatic philanderer (one wife and two mistresses, all apparently quite happy) begins to crack under the weight of his abundance. By turns brooding and comic, and filled with the suspense that comes from the inexorable unfolding of character, Flights of Love is nothing less than masterful

THE #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER 'Bernhard Schlink speaks straight to the heart' New York Times Olga is an orphan raised by her grandmother in a Prussian village around the turn of the 20th century. Smart and precocious, she fights against the prejudices of the time to find her place in a world that sees her as second-best. When she falls in love with Herbert, a local aristocrat obsessed with the era's dreams of power, glory and greatness, her life is irremediably changed. Theirs is a love against all odds, entwined with the twisting paths of German history, leading us from the late 19th to the early 21st century, from Germany to Africa and the Arctic, from the Baltic Sea to the German south-west. This is the story of that love, of Olga's devotion to a restless man - told in thought, letters and in a fateful moment of great rebellion.

Growing up with his mother in Germany, Peter Debauer knows little about his father, an apparent victim of the Second World War. But when he stumbles upon a few pages from a long-lost novel, Peter embarks on a quest that leads him across Europe to the United States, chasing fragments of a story within a story and a master of disguises who may or may not exist. Homecoming" "is a tale of fathers and sons, men and women, war and peace. It reveals the humanity that survives the trauma of war and the ongoing possibility for redemption.

Hailed for its coiled eroticism and the moral claims it makes upon the reader, this mesmerizing novel is a story of love and secrets, horror and compassion, unfolding against the haunted landscape of postwar Germany.

When he falls ill on his way home from school, fifteen-year-old Michael Berg is rescued by Hanna, a woman twice his age. In time she becomes his lover--then she inexplicably disappears. When Michael next sees her, he is a young law student, and she is on trial for a hideous crime. As he watches her refuse to defend her innocence, Michael gradually realizes that Hanna may be guarding a secret she considers more shameful than murder.

A prize-winning Cold War spy novel from the author of international megaseller THE READER Young lawyer Georg Polger gives up a comfortable existence in Germany to work as a freelance translator in the South of France. But business in the picturesque village is far from booming, and Georg struggles to make ends meet. One day he is approached by a certain Mr Bulnakov, who wants Georg to take over a local translation agency. The previous owner has just died in mysterious circumstances. Everything seems to be going perfectly: Georg falls in love with Bulnakov's attractive secretary, Francoise, and takes on a lucrative project left unfinished by his predecessor, translating plans for military helicopters. But everything changes when Georg notices Francoise copying his plans. She tells Georg that Bulnakov has threatened to harm her brother, who lives in Poland, if she refuses to do his bidding. When Georg confronts Bulnakov Francoise disappears, and mysterious elements within the village try to hound him out. All he has left of Francoise is a picture she gave him of a church, which she told him was in Warsaw. But when a friend tells him the church is actually in New York, Georg flies to America in a desperate bid to track down Francoise, and unravel the web of deceit. Tailed from his arrival, Georg quickly realises that he is stuck between the CIA and the KGB, and further out of his depth than he can begin to comprehend. But which side was he working for? Who is the mysterious Mr Bulkanoff? And did he ever know the real Francoise?

The second novel in the bestselling Gerhard Self detective series, from the author of The Reader In Self's Deception, private investigator Gerhard Self receives a request to track down the daughter of Herr Salger, the Assistant Secretary of Bonn, who's been absent from her translation classes at the university. Repelled by the pomposity of the government official, he rejects the case. But an insistent letter--and five thousand marks--changes his mind. After discrete interrogations at her school and her former residences, and a quick survey of the local hospitals, it turns out she washed up at a psych ward where he's told she had fallen out a window earlier that week and died. He quickly decides this is a lie, and decides one of the doctors is covering for her. Self quickly discovers that his quarry was involved in a terrorist incident--but a terrorist incident that the government is clearing covering up. Self helps the woman escape, finds out his own client is not Herr Salger at all but another terrorist. Now the mystery becomes what exactly happened at the military arms depot that the government doesn't want made public.

'Perfectly crafted, intricate and haunting stories' from the bestselling author of THE READER. A mesmeric collection of stories about love. In his characteristically unsentimental, elegant and spare prose, Schlink unveils characters and relationships haunted by betrayal and guilt, in situations where self-examination is inescapable. FLIGHTS OF LOVE consists of seven stories, all of them weaving around the idea of love - why people are drawn to it and why some run away. Schlink shows us in turn love as desire, love as confusion, love as a quick affair, love as a drastic life-changing rebellion, love as a force of habit, love as self-betrayal. The cumulative effect is a book which uses effortlessly beguiling language to examine the universal human desire to find a lasting loving relationship, however thwarted that desire ultimately is.

As a young man, Gerhard Self served as a Nazi prosecutor. After the war he was barred from the judicial system and so became a private investigator. He has never, however, forgotten his complicity in evil.
Hired by a childhood friend, the aging Self searches for a prankish hacker who's invaded the computer system of a Rhineland chemical plant. But his investigation leads to murder, and from there to the charnel house of Germany's past, where the secrets of powerful corporations lie among the bones of numberless dead. What ensues is a taut, psychologically complex, and densely atmospheric moral thriller featuring a shrewd, self-mocking protagonist.

Im April hat der Deutsche Bundestag entschieden, Import und Forschung an menschlichen embryonalen Stammzellen nur unter strengsten Auflagen und nur fA1/4r "hochrangige Forschungsziele" zu erlauben. In Deutschland selbst ist die Gewinnung embryonaler Stammzellen zu Forschungszwecken durch das Embryonenschutzgesetz verboten. Dennoch ist die Affentliche Gesellschaft aufgefordert, den ethischen Fragen zur PrAimplantationsdiagnostik, zu Stammzellenforschung sowie des therapeutischen und reproduktiven Klonens im Raum zwischen Wissenschaft und Recht verstArkt nachzugehen. Bernhard Schlink, an der Humboldt-UniversitAt zu Berlin lehrender Professor fA1/4r A-ffentliches Recht und Rechtsphilosophie, untersucht in nun vorliegender erweiterter Fassung eines im Dezember 2001 gehaltenen Vortrages die verfassungsrechtlichen Vorgaben fA1/4r Embryonenschutz im Kontext der bisherigen Rechtsprechung des Bundesverfassungsgericht zum Schwangerschaftsabbruch. Gut verstAndlich geschrieben, formuliert der Autor sich widersprechende Ergebnisse und verdeutlicht damit, dass der Gesetzgeber zurzeit in seiner Haltung zum Lebensschutz uneindeutig regelt. Schlink appelliert sowohl an die rechtswissenschaftliche Dogmatik als auch an den Gesetzgeber, den WidersprA1/4chen klArend zu begegnen.

The author of international phenomenon THE READER returns with a tale of old jealousies, explosive politics and uncertain futures. Meet the Baader-Meinhof Group, 25 years on... Old friends and lovers reunite for a weekend in a secluded country home after spending decades apart. They plumb their memories of each other and pass quiet judgements on the life decisions each has made since their youth. This isn't, however, just any old reunion, and their conversations of the old days aren't typical reminiscences. After 24 years, Joerg - a convicted murderer and terrorist, is released from prison on a pardon. A former member of the Red Army Faction (or Baader-Meinhof Group), the announcement of Joerg's release is sure to send shock waves throughout Germany. But before this happens, his group of friends - most of whom had been RAF sympathizers - gather for his first weekend of freedom. They are invited by Christiane, Joerg's devoted sister, whose suffocating concern for her brother is matched only by the unrelenting pull of Marcko, a dangerously passionate young man intent on using Joerg to continue the cause.

Michael Berg tiene quince anos. Un dia, regresando a casa del colegio empieza a encontrarse mal y una mujer acude en su ayuda. La mujer se llama Hanna y tiene treinta y seis anos. Unas semanas despues, el muchacho, agradecido, le lleva a su casa un ramo de flores.
Este sera el principio de una relacion erotica en la que, antes de amarse. Ella siempre le pide a Michael que le lea en voz alta fragmentos de Schiller, Goethe, Tostoi, Dickens... el ritual se repite durante varios meses, hasta que un dia Hanna desaparece sin dejar rastro.
Siete anos despues, Michael, estudiante de derecho, acude al juicio contra cinco mujeres acusadas de criminales de guerra nazis y de ser las responsables de la muerte de varias personas en el campo de concentracion del que eran guardianas. Una de las acusadas es Hanna. Y Michael se debate entre los gratos recuerdos y la sed de justicia, trata de comprender que llevo a Hanna a cometer esas atrocidades, trata de descubrir quien es en realidad la mujer a la que amo...