ALL THE FREQUENT TROUBLES OF OUR DAYS
An Instant New York Times Bestseller
Winner, National Book Critics Circle Award
Winner, PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award
winner, The Chautauqua PRIZE
Finalist, Los Angeles Times Book Award
finalist, Plutarch Award
“A stunning literary achievement.” – KAI BIRD, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Biography
"Donner's story reads with the speed of a thriller, the depth of a novel, and the urgency of an essay, like some deeply compelling blend of Alan Furst and W.G. Sebald." – JAMES WOOD
“Astonishing…wilder and more expansive than a standard-issue biography….[an] extraordinarily intimate book… Donner is Harnack’s great-great-niece, so this is a family history too. It is also a story of code names and dead drops, a real-life thriller with a cruel ending — not to mention an account of Hitler’s ascent from attention-seeking buffoon to genocidal Führer….Donner’s decision to narrate events in the present tense [is] an effective device for conveying what it felt like in real time to experience the tightening vise of the Nazi regime.” – Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times
“A tour de force of investigation… The story unfolds in fragments… but as the pieces cohere, the couple’s story becomes gripping… The abiding impression is of virtuous, extraordinarily brave people caught up in tragic horror.”–The Economist
“It’s against a tense backdrop of political terror that we recognise Mildred’s extraordinary bravery. This is a superb, sure-footed work of historical detection conceived with a powerful intelligence.” – The Sunday Times (UK)
“This is a powerful book. A nonfiction narrative with the pace of a political thriller, it’s imbued with suspense and dread.” – The Wall Street Journal
“Donner quotes passages from her sources at length, letting the reader dwell on facts rather than galloping through them. She does this stylishly, sometimes presenting events in chronological lists or highlighting fragments from her research as stand-alone text. The archival quality of the book, its enumeration and cataloging of sources, is both surprising for a biography — too rarely the site of literary innovation — and affecting.” – Madeleine Schwartz, The New York Times Sunday Book Review
“Rebecca Donner’s passionate, page-turning book, “All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days”...melds history and biography. She brings forensic and literary skills — along with access to family papers and a key witness — to a story at once deeply personal and broadly inspiring” – The Boston Globe
“All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days sets the remarkable story of resistance fighter Mildred Harnack against the backdrop of daily life in Germany as Hitler tightened his grip. Epic in sweep, written with a novelist’s attention to detail and a historian’s perspective on social and political forces, this book opens up new possibilities for biography.” – RUTH FRANKLIN, winner of the NBCC Award for Biography, author of Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life
“How can it happen that a constitution, a free press, and a democracy be demolished — all within six months? This powerfully written story of Mildred Harnack, resistance fighter against Hitler, tells step by step the way the German republic fell to the Nazis. Read All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days, and be warned.”– MAXINE HONG KINGSTON, winner of the National Book Award, author of The Woman Warrior
“Combining meticulous scholarship and sparkling narrative brio, Rebecca Donner’s All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days brings to life for the first time the central role played by Mildred Harnack in Germany’s homegrown opposition to Nazi rule. Donner’s portrait of the cruelly oppressive system against which Harnack and her circle fought serves to remind us of what can happen when, amidst economic insecurity and anguish over dislocating socio-cultural change, a highly civilized nation embraces demagoguery over democracy.” – DAVID CLAY LARGE, author of Berlin
“A gorgeous collage of history and family lore, a revelatory window onto a Götterdämmerung that transformed the world forever.” – Oprah Daily, named a Best New Book of August
“Donner’s meticulous research and novelist’s sensibility make for a riveting biography of a remarkable and brave woman.” – Library Journal
“Despite its ostensibly forbidding subject matter this is a thrilling and inspiring book...a treasure trove for lovers of biography, new writing and the history of the Third Reich.” – The Scotsman (UK)
“Donner has clearly worked hard in East German, Soviet, and recently released American archives to tell an impressive story.” – Kirkus Reviews
"[A] stunning biography...Donner’s research is impeccable, and her fluid prose and vivid character sketches keep the pages turning.”– Publishers Weekly (starred review)
A New York Times Notable Book
A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice
A New York Times Book Review Critics’ Top Book
A Wall Street Journal Best Book of the Year
A TIME Magazine Must-Read Book of the Year
The Economist’s Best Book of the Year
A New York Post Best Book of the Year
A Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Best Book of the Year
An Oprah Daily Best New Book of August
A BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week
A New York Public Library Book of the
Week
A Publishers Weekly Top Ten Book of the Year
A Barnes & Noble Best History Book of the Year
A Barnes & Noble Best Audiobook of the Year
