The 7th Day
– Nika Lubitsch
Review by
JJ Marsh
Nika Lubitsch’s Germany-set crime novel is a page-turning
adventure that sticks in your mind.
Sybille is on trial for her husband’s murder. While on
trial, as witnesses queue up to defame the once-glamorous darling of the
society pages, flashbacks tell the story up till now. The structure is
reminiscent of Memento, as our central character, and the reader, try to
make sense of what has happened. The question also arises, can we trust our narrator?
As her lawyer, Ulli, battles to prove her innocence over six
days of legal proceedings, Sybille recalls how she met Michael, their life
together and how it all fell apart in such spectacular fashion. The young heady
days of falling in love, the resilience of their romance in overcoming
obstacles, their joys and triumphs are believable and enjoyable.
So well are Lubitsch’s characters drawn, that you feel you
know them as good friends. So when Sybille’s world collapsed, I found myself
saying, ‘But how could he? That’s just not like him.’
The clues are expertly woven and the tension increases over
this taut, lean thriller till we discover the truth of the tale on the seventh
day. The ending is atmospheric and exciting, not to mention brilliantly
executed.
Unsurprisingly, a Kindle bestseller.
One of my favourite elements of this books was the use of
setting. Berlin society comes vividly to life and after I put the book down, I
started planning my next mini-break. This is the perfect book for a long train
journey, as it’s short enough to devour in one sitting. But woe betide anyone
who tries to talk to you before you get to the end.
Interview
with Nika Lubitsch
The first thing that appealed to me about The
7th Day was the unusual structure. A woman on trial for the murder of her
husband, the tension happens both in the present and via a series of
flashbacks. Why did you choose this format?
I like stories that aren´t told in a chronological
order. In a mystery a person´s life is supposed to take a course that makes
murder inevitable. If you start out by describing the wonderful life a
protagonist has, the story usually ends up being so utterly boring. Therefore,
I need the murder to happen at the very start to pique the readers´ curiosity,
because they then will ask themselves how the protagonist might have ended up
in trouble to begin with. For me, suspense is created by opposition and the
clash of the ways the different characters assess a situation.
One of the features of Triskele Books and our
Bookclub is the role of place in the story. The 7th Day is rooted powerfully in
Berlin. Which elements, for you, really bring a location to life?
I try to write books whose plots are based partly on
their locations. My stories can´t just be transplanted to different cities or
countries. Berlin offers a lot of options: the city´s not always so
squeaky-clean history, its legacy issues after two world wars and Sovjet
occupation, its isolated location in the middle of another state with a
different jurisdiction, its vicinity to the Polish border – all these factors
give a spark to unique plots. Besides its history and politics, it´s also its
typical streets and squares that mark the city´s character. Berlin is very
large and its neighborhoods sometimes differ from each other as if they were
located on continents apart. On the one hand you have Zehlendorf, a
neighborhood of stately mansions, copper beeches, imposing art nouveau town
houses, and enchanted lakes. But there also is Neukölln, home of the largest
Turkish community outside of Istanbul. By the way, I had a letter from a reader
who knew exactly where my “secret location” is. He was able to name the country
as well as the site of the pink house and confirmed that it is possible to
simply disappear in this area, just as I have described it. Thus, I must have
done something right. All my books take place not only in Berlin but also in
other, sometimes exotic, countries, the condition, however, being that I must
have either lived or at least have visited there (like, for example, Guyana in
my book The 5th Commandment).
There is an immense confidence about your
writing – the way you switch from present to past tense, your use of the second
person for part of the narrative – can you tell us a little about your
background in writing?
I´ve been writing since I´ve been old enough to hold a
pen. Professionally, I worked as a journalist as well as a PR officer and
copywriter and also wrote a number of non-fiction books. Of course, I have also
looked into the theorie of creative writing over the years and am a fervent
believer in Sol Stein. However, I love to break rules and have noticed, for
example, that I happen to like narrative passages in books. For me it depends
on the narrator´s keynote. But in order to ignore rules, you have to know them
first.
Your research into German police and judicial
procedures seems extensive. How did you go about learning the way the system
worked?
Researching police matters was a rather frustrating
affair. That´s because German police keep their cards close to their chests.
“Just write your book the way you think it´s right. When your manuscript is
ready, you can mail it to us and we´ll look for mistakes.” Therefore, I left
the police where they belong: at the precinct. The department of corrections
was much more cooperative in this respect. The warden of the correctional
facility in Pankow showed me around the place for a number of hours. I was
allowed to talk to the inmates, be present when their children came to see
them, watch them at work bagging perfume samples, and participate in their
music lesson. What really knocked me over was the fact that the warden seemed
to be somehow sympathetic with her inmates, who were there on remand. She told
me about some women, whose cases really made her angry at our judicial system.
The press office at the criminal court also was very helpful. I was able to
witness some murder trials. However, I have a little legal background myself,
because I have a couple of terms at law school under my belt, with criminal law
having been about the only thing that fascinated me. Among my friends there are
one of the most famous German defense lawyers and also a notary, which meant
that these matters were the least of my problems. The translation into English
worried me much more, as our legal procedures are very different from those in
the US. With Karin Dufner I had the support of a very competent woman. Karin
even used to translate legal documents for a living and was able to furnish
some explanations, as she knows her way around both systems.
You chose to publish independently and rapidly
became a German Kindle Bestseller. What made you decide to do it yourself?
The decision wasn´t really my choice. Even though I
never had a problem to convince renowned publishing houses to publish my works
of non-fiction, not a soul was interested in my novels. It simply costs less
money to publish a translation than to invest effort into developing a new
author. Ten years ago The 7th Day was rejected by all major
publishers of mystery fiction which led to the manuscript gathering cobwebs on
my hard drive. As curiosity is one of my traits, I just tried out KDP last
summer with my short stories, which I had been writing for years to stay in
practice. And, lo and behold, the book sold quite well. Therefore, I unearthed
The 7th Day, dusted it off, moved the plot ten years ahead into the
future, and uploaded it. Five days later I was on the top of the best selling
list, where my book remained for three months. I think nobody was more
surprised than I was.
Some reviews I’ve read surprised me by finding
the sexual content rather strong. I found the sex scenes entirely appropriate
for the age and enthusiasm of Sybille. To me, it also says a lot about her
partners. Have such reviews changed the way you write?
Some days ago the a feuilleton writer with the “Zeit”,
THE German intellectual weekly paper, wanted to know why I resorted to
proletarian language so much. After all, my protagonists are professionals with
academic credentials. As an example, he quoted the term “poppen” (which isn´t
quite as harsh as “screw” but on roughly the same stylistic level). My answer
was that I only moved in academic circles and still never met anyone who´d use
the word “intercourse” when talking about sexual relations.
Would you ever write anything other than
mystery and crime?
Yes, of course. Under my real name I write funny,
ironic books of non-fiction in the tradition of Nora Ephron, who, by the way,
was my great idol. I also wrote a wonderful book together with my husband which
I´ll soon publish under yet another pseudonym. It´s a book of social fiction
that is set in the near future. Today, we even have a genre term for it:
dystopy. The kinds of books I definitely
won´t ever write are romance novels, erotic novels, and - never, ever -
historic novels.
What factors propelled you to the top of the
Kindle charts in Germany?
The cover just screams at you, the title is catching,
and story has an interesting beginning. More than 1,100 positive reviews help,
of course.
You say you live in Berlin but your soul lives
in Florida – why?
In 1997 I first went to Cape Coral. And while I was
there, my soul just settled next to a pelican on top of the bridge over the
Caloosahatchi. When it was time to leave four weeks later, I asked my soul
whether it wanted to come along. It just shook its head. Since that day I, of
course, have to return in regular intervals to check on it. This winter I´ll
spend six months in Cape Coral for the first time. That´s been my dream for
years, and since I´m now able to work anywhere thanks to writing, it finally
has become true. There were times I just couldn´t get away from Berlin. We were
homesick for Cape Coral so much that we made Florida the location of our social
fiction thriller, which has the preliminary title “Alligator Valley”. This way
we have been able to spend every evening with our protagonists in the independent
Senior Citizens´ Republic of Southwest Florida.
I’ve discovered lots of German-speaking authors
in translation since moving to Switzerland, such as Wolf Haas and Dürrenmatt.
Which writers would you recommend?
I love Sebastian Fitzek, a very nice Berlin mystery
colleague, who writes devious thrillers.
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