About the work
“Deutsches Haus” (published in English as “The German House”) is the first novel by the screenwriter Annette Hess, known for television series such as “Weissensee” and “Ku’damm 56”; it was published by Ullstein on 21 September 2018. The book became a bestseller, has been translated into almost 30 languages and was adapted by Hess herself as a television series in 2023. The first stage version was created by Jorinde Dröse and Johanna Vater; Dröse directed its premiere on 11 September 2026 at the Thalia Theater in Hamburg.
Plot
Frankfurt am Main, 1963: Eva Bruhns, the youngest daughter of the couple who run the inn “Deutsches Haus”, works as a Polish interpreter and is about to get engaged. Against the wishes of her family and her fiancé Jürgen, she translates the testimony of Polish witnesses at the first Frankfurt Auschwitz trial. The deeper she is drawn into the proceedings, the clearer it becomes that her own parents were connected to the camp – her father worked there as a cook for an SS barracks.
Cultural significance
The novel links a family drama with a key event in West Germany's reckoning with its Nazi past and explores repression, complicity and guilt in post-war society. Critical response was divided: the FAZ praised the courageous choice of subject, while the Süddeutsche Zeitung found the storytelling trivial; with readers, the book was a major success.